Alexander Germano's father was Czech and his mother was a Moravian Romani woman. ["Czech-Roma"] The son later attached the Romani ending -o to his father's family name German which was probably the Russian
form of Herman or the Czech Heřman. Thus, under the pseudonym Germano, he
became whom one could call, the first Roma author the world has known of
so far (1).
Alexander's parents moved to Russia during the second half of the nineteenth century. Mr. German was a worker installing water mains. Soon after the birth of his son Alexander (Sasha), he died of pneumonia; he had
caught a cold during the construction of a water main in Orel. The family now
depended on the mother and Sasha's two older sisters to support the family.
Despite financial difficulties, the women managed to assure Sasha's
education. After a three-year primary school (prikhodskoye uchilishche) he
entered a four-year junior secondary school (gorodskoye uchilishche) and from
there he went to the commercial high school in the city of Svyatoshchino near
Kiev. In 1915, he successfully completed his commercial studies.
In school, Sasha had already begun to write down various
observations and thoughts. He wrote in Russian because at home he heard his
mother's mother tongue,
Moravian Romani, only rarely. His mother was accustomed
to speaking Czech with his Czech father and later, after their arrival in
Russia, the whole family gradually came to speak Russian. Thus, Russian was
Sasha's first language.
In 1915, Alexander Germano's first essay,
"Cherv' gryzyot" ("The Worm gnaws"), appeared in the anthology "Orlovtsy – zhertvam voyny" ("Citizens of Orel – To the victims of war").
From 1919 to 1921, Alexander Germano served in the Red Army. There he worked as
a cultural educator. In 1921, he was demobilised and, from then on, devoted his
life to culture and literature.
In the city of Orel where he lived, he worked as an editor of a
local newspaper; wrote feuilletons, sketches and essays; organised literary
evenings; collected materials for the newly established Turgenev museum (2), and directed a local theatre
studio.
In 1921, he staged his first play,
"In Some Kind of Institution" ("V nekoem uchrezhdyenyi"), in the city theatre
of Orel. The play had a run of three hundred performances and appeared in two
publications.
In 1926, Alexander Germano moved to Moscow, where began the
longest and most important phase of his life – most important not only for him
but also for Roma culture and literature, and for Roma in general. Germano
writes in his autobiography:
The majority of Roma in Russia travelled at that time and the leaders
of the Soviet State – who were basically the heads of the Communist party –
wanted to settle the Gypsies. Finally the governments of many other countries
had the same aim. Unlike Western countries, in its early days (roughly until
the end of the thirties), the Soviet regime used the languages and culture of
small ethnic groups as a means toward their politico-social integration. Among
more than two hundred Soviet ethnic groups on the territory of the Soviet
Union, there were large numbers of small ethnocultural groups which had no
written literature or even a system of spelling their language. Among them were
the Roma. Alexander Germano was not brought up as a Rom, but he was a Rom on
his mother's side and his romanipe was resurrected by
the prestige of the official task that stood before him: to create spelling for
transcribing Romani, to write out the grammar of the Roma language, and to
develop Roma culture and literature.
He do not know all that he learned from his mother about
romipen ("Romhood"). But even if he had been brought up as a
Rom, the language and culture of the Moravian Roma was different from the
dialects and customs of Roma he met in Russia. Later Germano incorporated his
knowledge of the differences in languages and culture of various Roma groups
into his prose works. He did it very naturally and unobtrusively. When Roma
from different sub-ethnic groups met, they were accustomed to speaking at
length about the differences in their dialects. It was actually such a
conversation that Germano introduces into his story
"Miriklja" ("Beads", 1960). A natural conversation about
the Roma language takes place in a pub between Russian
"Romychoristers" (great city musicians): Maštak, the hero of
the story, and Feduk, a member of a Bessarabian clan of
"travelers and horse-thieves."
Germano developed a deep knowledge of Romipen
both by living among Roma and from literature. Much had been written about
Gypsies, but articles, scholarly papers, and language studies were scattered
among various periodicals and collections, and many of them had fallen into
oblivion long ago. Alexander Germano devoted three years to searching through
libraries and archives for what had been published about Gypsies in Russia and
where to find it. The outcome of his work was the
"Bibliography of Gypsies; Inventory of Books and
Papers from 1780 to 1930" ("Bibliografia o tsiganakh, ukazatel knig i statei
s 1780 po 1930"). The bibliography with a foreword by Prof. M. Sergiyevskiy
was published by the
Centrizda publishing house in
1930.
At that time, Germano divided his life between residing in libraries
and archives and living in travelling camps of Roma, where he wrote down their
folklore and learned their dialect.
"I spent a whole week in
camps. I learned the Gypsy language and so I began freely and naturally to
write verses and prose in the Gypsy language (3)
.""I got to know every aspect
of the life and feelings of travelling Gypsies," writes Germano in his
autobiography.
The first Germano literary work written in Romani, the story
"Ruvoro" ("Wolf Cub"), appeared in the first issue of
the Roma magazine
"Romany zoria" ("Romani Dawn") in the autumn of 1926. Alexander
Germano was the editor of the magazine.
At that time, Germano was accepted as a member of the Union of
Proletarian Writers,
"Kuznitsa" ("Smithy"), and, at the same time, he founded
the Roma literary group
"Romengiro lav" ("Word of Roma"). The author wrote verses and
stories in Romani, but he continued to write in Russian. The theme of his
Russian language works became almost exclusively Roma. His essay
"Gypsies" ("Tsiganye"), published in the collection
"Nasha Zhizenye" (1931) was highly praised by
Maxim Gorky.
Notable literary works in Russian dedicated to Roma are:
"Gypsies in Fiction from Dyerzhavin to Blok" ("Tsiganye v khudozhestvennoy lityerature ot
Dyerzhavina do Bloka"),
"Outline of the Gypsy Language" ("Osnovy tsiganskogo yazika"),
"Brief History of Soviet Gypsies" (in
collaboration with Rom-Lebedyev, Kratkaya istoriya sovietskikh tsigan) and
others.
At the end of the 1920's and beginning of the 1930's, Germano's
books in Romani were published one after another.
"Nevo dživiben" ("New Life", Centrizdat 1929),
"Les kharde ruvesa i vavre rospchenybena" ("They Called Him a Wolf and other stories",
GICHL 1933),
"Ganka Čamba i vavre rospchenybena" ("Ganka Tchamba and other stories", Goslitizdat
1935).
Germano's poetry written in Romani also appeared in several
independent collections:
"Lole jaga" ("Red Fire", GICHL 1934),
"Jav pre strega" ("Be on Guard", Molodaya Gvardya 1934),
"Gilja" (Songs, Goslitizdat 1935),
"Rospchenybena dre gilja" (
"Stories in Verse", Goslitizdat 1937),
"Neve Gilja" ("New Songs", Goslitizdat 1938).
In 1939, Alexander Germano translated into Romani Pushkin's works
"Skupy ritsar", ("The Stingy Knight") and
"Mozart i Salieri" ("Mozart and Salieri").
Apart from literary works, Germano also dedicated himself to
editing. He collaborated on the editing of all the works published in the
Roma language by various publishing houses.
Alexander Germano was highly influential in the founding of the
first professional Roma theatre in the world, the theatre
"Romen". The theatre had its premiere on
December 21, 1931, with the presentation of the play
"Džiiben pre roty" ("Life on wheels"). The author was Alexander
Germano. We learn from a review printed in the daily newspaper
"Pravda" that the play was met with great
enthusiasm from the audience. The play had a run of 1200 performances.
Alexander Germano had incredible energy. Apart from his literary and
editorial work, he organised reading and writing courses for illiterate Roma
and collaborated in the founding of Roma
"artyels" ("craft cooperatives"). During the Second World
War he fought actively as a member of the anti-aircraft defense in battles for
Moscow; later he joined groups of artists who organised cultural events for the
army and for soldiers in hospitals.
After a serious illness, Alexander Germano died on April 22, 1955.
(Factual information is drawn from the postscript to the book
"Povyesti i rasskazy", Moscow 1960. The author
of the postscript is B. Turganov.)
There are authors whose names appear in surveys of world literature
and who are known worldwide to the cultured public. (This certainly does not
mean that every cultured person would be able to relate the story of even one
of Shakespeare's dramas – even if he said that Shakespeare was the greatest
playwright of all time.) Without our denigrating the creative merit of
"world" authors which is rooted in astonishment over their
formal innovations, in their ability to grasp and express humanitarian worth,
in their storytelling abilities, in their humour, etc. – it is necessary to
admit the fact that they were born in a "great nation"
and wrote in some of the major languages of the time contributes to their
generally recognised "greatness".
Beside world-famous authors, there are writers whose names and works
are limited to a "national" literary circle. Every Czech
knows Božena Němcová. Many have read – or had to read in school – excerpts from
"Babička" or have seen the film version, but
how many of the relatively cultured English, Germans, French or Russians know
that such a Czech writer as Němcová existed?
For a number of reasons, representatives of Roma literature have
an even harder time to achieve recognition of their works than writers of any
other "small" nation.
Roma first proclaimed that they were a "nation" in the
year 2000, at the Fifth International Congress of the
IRU (Internacionalno Romani Unia [Emancipatory activities on an international level]) in
Prague. The declaration is in itself enormously important. Nevertheless, the
path to its fulfillment is not simple even if unprecedented communication
possibilities and philosophical-political and socio-cultural principles of the
globalised world with its goals of multiculturalism and humanisation can
contribute to the realisation of a non-traditional form of "a nation without
territory". Roma live the whole world over and boundaries of the internal
communities that constitute the entire society of Roma (Sinti, Kale, Manush, etc. [Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups / Index of appellations]) overlap the borders of the states and lands of
the "majority". Each community – group – speaks its own
dialect, which more or less differs from the dialects of the others. If Russian
Roma-Kalderaš Roman Demeter writes in
Kalderaš, the Kalderaš of Sweden,
Argentina or the Balkans will understand him better than German
Sinti or French Manush. But even
here there is a barrier: Roman Demeter published his collection of
Kalderaš folklore in Cyrillic. And this is
understandably foreign to Argentine Kalderaš. The
comprehension of literary works written in one of the
"national"Romani dialects is thus aggravated by the
spelling of the generally dominant orthography of the land in which the writer
lives. That means, for example, that Romani-Lovara in
the USA would be able to understand poems by the Lovari
poet Choli Dároczi of Hungary if they were read to them – but undoubtedly the
form in which they were written, influenced by Hungarian spelling, would be
difficult for them to read. The Worldwide Emancipation Movement of Roma bears
the need to solve the language problem and a great number of institutions and
individuals are working on it. Among others, the Roma press spontaneously
contributes to the mutual understanding of various dialects, and the number of
works of Roma literature is growing. Anyone who wants to read and understand
gets used to linguistic and orthographic differences of "foreign
works".
The official position of a society's "majority"
toward Roma very strongly influences the creation of Roma literature. For
example, the assimilatory policy of various lands has prevented the publication
of written Romani words. Some potential authors have not expressed themselves
at all in writing – or have written in the "foreign"
language of the "majority". (One example is the outstanding
poet Dezider Banga of Slovakia who published several Slovak collections, but
began to write in Romani only after 1990.) Publishing in Romani was difficult
not only in assimilatory states (mostly communist), but also in places where
official institutions in no way actually suppressed Roma culture. Here there
were other barriers: the market, money. What would the well-known publisher
Flammarion have done with the novel
"Les Usitory" ("The Fates") by the outstanding Roma (Kalderaš) writer from France, Matéo Maximoff, if he had
written it in Romani?
And so a long list of Roma writers have written in the language
of the "majority", not because they would have been unable
to publish in their mother tongue, but because it has basically been easier for
them to present their work to the public through the official language of the
country in which they have lived.
And then there are Roma writers who no longer master their
original ethnic tongue or come from traditionally assimilated groups. An
example is the novel of the Hungarian Rom, Menyhert Lakatosz, which, in the
German translation, for example, bears the title
"Bitterer Rauch" ("Bitter Smoke").
National literature generally implies one aspect. It belongs to the
"pillars" of national identity, national pride. A
"pillar" naturally does not go up by itself – someone must
put it up. School constructs the foundations of the pillars. Finally someone
builds the pillars, decorates them and presents them before the eyes of
state institutions, associations, etc. And so probably all Czechs are
consciously or subconsciously proud of Karel Hynek Mácha. Young lovers from
Prague and nearby put flowers at his monument on Petřín hill. But which of
them, inculcated with "their pride, Mácha", ever read
Mácha's poem,
"May", in its entirety? For the building of
identity, the poem certainly has great symbolic importance even if many do not
know its factual contents at all.
The function of Roma literature as "pillars" of
national identity has been insufficiently realised. It is mainly because the
space for builders of the "pillars" is enormously limited.
Whenever has a Rom had the opportunity to learn in school about Alexander
Germano of the former Soviet Union,
Matéo Maximoff
of France, Katarina Taikon
of Sweden [
Rosa Taikon
], Dezider Banga of Slovakia, Luminiça Cioba of Romania, Tera Fabiánová
of the Czech Republic, and so many others? The construction by the school of
"cultural pillars" as a support for national Roma identity
and pride still lies in the future.
How can we evaluate Alexander Germano, when we consider all the
aforementioned aspects that occur to us in relation to Roma literature? (And
if we operate with the term
"Roma literature", we are then forced to use
another term,
"national literature", whether we like it or
not).
Alexander Germano was one of the first and
"oldest" Roma authors – if we don't count the legendary
poet Giňa Raňičić (died 1890) from Serbia.
Is he really a "Roma writer" if he is a Rom
only on his mother's side while his father was of Czech origin? Is he a
"Roma" writer if his first language was Russian and he
learned Romani only as an adult?
When we write about the decade of the flowering of Roma culture in
the Soviet Union - from the end of the 1920's to the end of the 1930's –
then Alexander Germano is put in first place as a Roma (Gypsy) writer and
cultural figure. He says about himself (viz. quotation above by B. Tuganov)
that he mastered Romani perfectly and that he did not have the slightest
difficulty in writing verses and stories in Romani.
There have been other authors who have written in their
"second" language and never in the
"first" they automatically learned at home. We do not have
to look far: among them was the famous "Czech" writer Božena
Němcová. She wrote in her second language, Czech, rather than her first
language, German, for patriotic reasons. On the other hand, other authors have
chosen a "second" language because it had wider reception in
the world than their own mother tongue. Among these are a number of Indian
authors writing in English, such as Mulk Radj Anand and Balvant Gargi.
How can we evaluate Germano's Romani literary expression from the
linguistic point of view? So far we have not come across any other evaluations
of his works. If we may make our own judgment, we would say that the author
expresses himself easily, spontaneously and creatively in Romani. Our
assessment does have its limitations: The author writes in the language of the
so-called "Russian Roma" while our own dialect is that of
the so-called Slovak (Servika) Roma. Nevertheless, thanks
to numerous contacts with Roma of various groups and thanks to the reading of
accessible Roma literature, we have not found Germano's language especially
difficult to understand and assess.
An insufficiency of sources prevents us from making the most
thorough assessment of Germano's works. We have obtained only three of his
publications. Two of them are written in Romani, one in Russian. One of the
Romani publications is literary, the other political. Germano's stories are
translated from Romani in the Russian publication. We will treat each of them
later. First, we would like to discuss briefly the entire
"profile" of Alexander Germano in the context of the
historical period in which he worked and wrote. Soviet ethnic politics in the
above-mentioned decade (from the end of the 1920's to the end of the
1930's) was first evaluated quite uncritically as an unprecedented example of
a human approach to a small, previously suppressed and backward
"ethnic group" (Russian:
"narodnost"). Lenin's slogan
"korenyizatsiya" (to go to the roots) meant supporting the
development of "small" languages and culture. Languages
which had never been written before became "literary";
systems of spelling were formulated; textbooks were written in them, and
literature was published in them. Understandably, all of this activity was
administered by the state and it was subject to the political and ideological
aims of the totalitarian Soviet regime.
Political ideology even penetrated artistic works. It is difficult
to say to what extent writers themselves identified with it. For many, the
Soviet system undoubtedly meant "hope for a just new order".
It is little wonder that leaders of those small ethnic groups whose culture and
language were supported both in words and in practice were quite frankly
devoted to the Soviet regime. One of the small ethnic groups was the
"Gypsies". Roma (Kalderaš)
historian and ethnologist Nadyezhda Demeterova writes in her publication
"Istoriya tsygan" (2000):
Only Nadyezhda Demeterova evaluates this era very critically –
perhaps even too much so – but her "novy vzglyad"
("new look"), the subtitle of the book, is probably a
reaction to the "Soviet-type" lack of criticism.
Alexander Germano also wrote a book of political propaganda:
"Džana neve Roma" ("New Roma are coming"). It was published in
1933 (Profizdat, Moscow) and deals with the system of Gypsy collective farms
and
"artyels" ("craft cooperatives"). A brief introduction to
the chapter
"Dre kralitska berša" ("From the time of Czarism"),
"Nacyonal'no pučibe angil Oktjabrsko
revoljucyja" ("Question of ethnic groups before the October
Revolution") and
"Syr dživinde Roma dre phurane berša" ("How Roma lived in old times") indicate that
here we come across stereotypical phrases of that time. For example:
"(…) Kralitko Rossija sas
bare staribnasa vaš tykne nacionaľnostenge (…)" ("Czarist Russia was a
prison for small ethnic groups."). Or
"Vaš amenge – činďa o
Lenino – uchtylla akana adaja kuľturno revoljucyja vaš odova, soby te javas
pherdes socyjalističeskone stronasa." ("For us – wrote Lenin – a
new cultural revolution has now started so that we may become a completely
socialistic land.") The informational value of Germano's pamphlets lies
in our learning about the socio-economic politics of the Soviet state
concerning the Roma. This consists of founding Gypsy collective farms and craft
cooperatives, which understandably presumed the settling of Roma on
state-allocated land. Germano makes an exact listing of resolutions in
historical order, on the basis of which the collective farms were established.
On October 1, 1926, the first law about cooperation with Gypsies who wanted to
settle was passed. On February 20, 1928, a second document about
"allocation of land to
Gypsies who wish to change over to a settled and industrious way of
life
" ("Te des romenge phuv, save
piridžjana ko butitko ekheštetytko džiiben." ) was passed. Apart from
land, the Roma received money to begin farming. Naturally, the land the Roma
were given was often in completely unknown areas. In a long story called, in
the Russian translation,
"V putyi" ("On the road", 1933, in the book "Povyesti i
rasskazy", 1960) Germano describes a train journey of several days beyond the
Urals, where a Roma community from near Moscow was assigned collective farm
land. According to Nadyezhda Demeterova, in 1938 there were 52 working Gypsy
collective farms. The author says that Gypsy collectives made up 2-5% of the
entire Roma population and that that form of farming could not have had an
influence on the overall life of the Gypsies.
It is understandable that Germano views collective farms, at the
time that experiments with them had begun, differently from N. Demeterova with
her distance of seventy-years. The Roma ethnologist, for example, states that
the
"system of collective farms
is in complete contradiction to the Gypsy mentality. The absolute majority of
travelers could not connect to farm work; they lacked the necessary work
habits. It would be naive to imagine that Gypsies accepted the idea of
collective and badly paid work with enthusiasm.". On the contrary,
Germano highlights the enthusiasm of the Gypsies on the collectives and in
craft cooperatives in various parts of his pamphlet.
Demeterova may not be completely right. The fact is that Roma avoid
but'i ("hard physical labour") if they
are from castes whose professional dharma (traditional
and
"caste" ideology of sanctified professions) is not
but'i but rather music or trade. They distance
themselves from physical labour not because they are "lazy"
but because but'i belongs to the dharma of other castes (cauldron makers, blacksmiths, basket
makers, trough makers, masons, day laborers – Romani: but'akere.) And since they do not identify with these
groups, they do not identify with discharging their professions. On the other
hand, but'akere Roma – Roma craftsmen – placed great value on physical labour.
(This is proved, for example, by posters of the "model
worker" or "member of the brigade of the socialist work
brigade", which still decorate the walls of many Roma households in
the Czech Republic. Many of these Roma would be happy to work if only they
could get a job.)
If Germano writes about various zealous Roma workers – mainly
women – we needn't doubt him, even if we have had bad experience with the
veracity of communistic rhetoric. Germano's propagandist political pamphlet of
1933,
"Džana nevve roma" pays tribute to communist
ideology and is full of clichés, but it would be worth analysing it at least
linguistically. The author must have struggled with the creation of new words
which didn’t exist in Romani until then, and some (not all!) of his neologisms
are so successful that they could still be used today. Loyalty can be felt even
in the literary works of Alexander Germano – although to a basically lesser
degree than in the political pamphlet
"Džana nevve roma". (Incidentally, very few of
the great non-Roma artists of the time were unloyal!) Germano is enough of
an artist; he is honest enough and he knows enough about life that his story
and dramatic expression take precedence over his loyalty. Germano's communist
convictions are expressed, for example, in his look at "Gypsy
kulaks" - rich Roma either from a group of horse traders or cauldron
makers.
N. Demeterova – herself from a rich Kalderaš
family – considers "wealth of Roma" something natural,
traditional. She writes:
Travelling Roma – some individuals and some groups – were rich. Since
they moved from place to place, they could not invest in real estate. Their
property had to be easy to carry and, at the same time, have value. They
invested their wealth in gold and silver jewellery and coins. N. Demeterova
writes that the Soviet State advanced against "Gypsy kulaks"
not so it could prevent them from exploiting other Roma, but so that it could
seize their not negligible wealth. Proofs of how a number of
"robbed" Roma disappeared without a trace began to be
discovered many, many years after the Second World War.
If, at the beginning of the thirties, Alexander Germano looks at
"Gypsy kulaks" differently from Nadyezhda Demeterova seventy
years later, it is not only for ideological reasons or because of differing
measures of awareness of their times. I imagine that Alexander Germano's
inclusion (or rather, non-inclusion) in Roma society played a large role. His
mother was a Romni; his father Czech and a worker, and they moved to Russia.
Although Germano was half Rom, he was in no way bound to any Roma community.
After the premature death of his father, his family was financially very badly
off. Despite that, the son, Sasha, finished high school. From this, the values
of the milieu from which he came are apparent. Thus, Germano could not
personally empathise with Roma who valued wealth and got rich. And so it was
easy for him to be ideologically contemptuous of "Gypsy
kulaks".
He personifies in the figure of Maštak his (kindred) non-inclusion
in communities of Roma. Maštak appears in several stories. In the outstanding
work
"Miriklja" ("Beads" 1928) (5), he is a Rom discharged
from the Red Army. He wanders around the country and happens upon a travelling
camp of horse thieves.
The camp is ruled like a dictatorship by the boorish Gazun. Gazun
receives Maštak - as traditional Roma hospitality dictates – but he is
suspicious of him because Maštak is from another Roma community and also
because he has been recruited into the Gadžo army.
Nevertheless the uniform makes Maštak at least a somewhat equal partner to
Gazun. Maštak is a Rom, but because he is modern and
"different", he will forget traditional etiquette from time
to time and so, for example, without any ulterior motive, he jokes with Gazun's
daughter Tusa, who is promised to someone else. Thus the relationships among
the actors in the story becomes complicated and the reader is in suspense as he
reads what is going to happen next. The tension rises when Maštak promises Tusa
that he will buy her a string of beads. The word
"beads" has a mysterious impact on Gazun. From the
time Maštak utters it, Gazun keeps asking what he knows about some beads – and
he contemplates making his suspicious guest leave the camp. He even considers
killing him. Meanwhile, a battle is approaching. Battles between the Whites and
the Reds have still not stopped and somewhere there is always a bloody
conflict. Maštak, who has been to war and has had experience with it, urges
Gazun to move the camp as soon as possible. Gazun is very aware of the danger,
but he postpones his departure. He is even more suspicious of and hostile
toward Maštak: Does Maštak perhaps have an ulterior motive by trying to
persuade him to move the camp? Heavy gunfire is approaching. Maštak runs and
hides. At the last moment he manages to leave the camp, which is hit by a bomb
immediately afterwards. When he returns after the battle, he finds everyone
dead, torn apart by the explosion. The explosion has dug a giant crater in the
earth, and there Maštak catches sight of an overturned vessel with scattered
gold jewelry and coins and
"miriklja" This is the buried treasure for which
Gazun did not leave the camp and so he brought destruction upon himself and all
his people.
Although this story was originally written in Romani, we,
unfortunately, obtained only the Russian translation. And so we can assess only
its contents and the style carried over to another language. The plot is
gripping. The writing is very vivid and effective with dialogue and brief but
fitting descriptions. The author's insertion of some traditional customs adds
atmosphere to the story.
He describes, for example, the old woman of a clan exorcising
misfortune: She takes ashes out of the fire into her fist and, blowing them,
pronounces: "Misfortune, go to someone else's head." (It is a pity that the
translator did not quote the Roma exorcism in Romani, as he did for some of
the songs he quoted. Ethnographic descriptions of songs don't "stick
out", but become an organic component of the story.) Immeasurably
interesting in this collection is the story
"Surkica" (written in 1946). The author (this
time speaking in the first person) brings Roma literature to the Roma
family of an old man, Jon Murzej. Murzej is grieving for his son. Before the
war, he was a member of a collective farm; then he was inducted into the Red
Army. The war ended, but the son had not yet returned. Old Murzej's head is too
full of worries for him to be interested in Roma literature. But a thin, old,
black woman comes and begins to read Romani fluently. Her not-quite-Romani
accent dismays the narrator. It turns out that old Surkica is a
romani judica (a "Roma-Jewess").
During a pogrom against the Jews in 1905, her whole family was murdered and
only she escaped. She was taken in by Gypsies; Murzej married her. She joined a
Roma community; Romani became her second mother tongue... The story is based
on a real event (6). It is related soberly, factually, nearly
journalistically – and human destiny unadorned with superfluous commentaries
appears here in the full strength of its uniqueness.
The title of another of Germano's books,
"Rospchenybena dre gilja" ("Stories in song/in verse"), testifies to its
character. It is written in Romani. The author tells stories in the form of
rhythmic prose divided into non-rhyming verses. It is inspired by Russian folk
epic poetry. As in the best stories in the collection
"Pověsti i rasskazy", here, too, Germano
demonstrates his gift for telling an exciting story and unobtrusively
introducing an effective visual and acoustic atmosphere which give credibility
to the plot and increases its dramatic effect.
We will briefly summarise the plot of the story
"Feldytko bida" ("The Pain of Travelling") and then we will
conclude with excerpts from his poems in an English translation and a facsimile
of the Romani original.
Travelling horse trader Galun (interesting analogy with the name
Gazun in the story
"Miriklja". The bearers of these similar names
even have similar characters.) returns with his young wife and two young sons
from an annual town fair to his distant camp. Business had been good but he
drank up most of the money he earned and did not recover from his drunkenness
on the return trip in his old wagon. At night they meet some strangers, Roma
fleeing on horses. They are horse thieves who are being pursued by furious
villagers. The thieves manage to escape, but Galun's family find themselves in
mortal danger: if the villagers find them, they will pour out their fury on
them – for Gadže, all Gypsies are alike. Galun hurries
into the muddy woods with his horse and wagon. They are hidden, but the young
son at his mother's breast cries and can't be comforted. He could betray the
family. Galun, mad with fear, gags the child – and thereby strangles him.
If we conclude with a brief assessment of the importance of
Alexander Germano, we can say that he is one of the first Roma writers ever.
At the same time he was a leading cultural, pedagogical and educational figure
at a time when the Soviet Union promoted the linguistic and cultural
development of small ethnic groups. Germano's literary and linguistic talent
prevailed over his Soviet loyalty, to which the present times are allergic. The
artistic value of some of Germano's stories and poems extends beyond his time
and the borders of "Roma national literature" and would
most definitely deserve world recognition.
|