Part One
Memorie.al / “Assembly of Letters with Friends – the rich correspondence of Mustafa Merlika-Kruja”, included in four volumes, provide the dimension not only of this personality but also documents and clarify many dark sides of our history during the most delicate period, before and after World War II, when the communists took power.
These consist of 11 years of correspondence with the friar from Puka, who found the signatory from Kruja in a difficult spiritual state: “without family, but with the hope that one day I shall see them, yet without friends forever!” This letter touches upon one of the most neuralgic points of the time when, at the height of the establishment of the communist regime, two personalities in exile seek the reasons why Albania was failing to establish a state. Mustafa Kruja mentions a saying by Father Fishta, which for the Franciscan seems unbelievable and quite radical for the time.
Mustafa Kruja presents this entire panorama in a 1952 letter to the Franciscan priest, which, as in other letters, becomes a historical apotheosis through a non-dilettante view of history, while certainly remaining within the traces of subjectivism despite the objectivity. This is because we are dealing simply with personal correspondence and not at all with claims of writing formal history.
Thus, in the fourth volume of the series of Mustafa Kruja’s correspondence with friends and collaborators – personalities of Albania’s political and cultural life from various fields (published by “OMSCA-1”) – this is considered the most complete and perhaps the most interesting for the reader. It presents a correspondence between two personalities quite different in age and background, yet with a precious contribution to national cultures, which, through their literary conversation, examines and clarifies various events and themes of Albanian history from the first half of the last century.
One was a protagonist of political and cultural life, one of the signatories of the Document of Independence, a participant in most of the events that marked the history of the Albanian state in the first thirty years of its existence. The other was a Franciscan friar, a former history teacher at the “Illyricum” lyceum, who had made the research of this subject the main goal of his life, alongside his service to the faith.
They were separated by an age difference of twenty years, but united by the desire for deep study, love for their country, persistence in the search for historical truth, and a hope – remained only within the limits of the term – to see a democratic and dignified Albania.
The correspondence began on an April day in 1947, when Father Paulini, living in Bolzano in a convent where he served as a priest, learned that in Ortisei – a tourist locality in Trentino, one of the most beautiful parts of Italy – resided Mustafa Kruja, a well-known name in Albanian life. He decided to write to him to establish a connection.
These letters are part of the fourth volume, where the rich correspondence of Mustafa Merlika-Kruja documents and sheds light on many dark sides of our history during the most delicate period. Even though it is correspondence, what is valued in them is the refinement of knowledge, as if these were articles published for readers and not just between themselves. Perhaps this was a prospective project of Merlika’s, which he imposed on every correspondent, giving us a school of thought.
LETTER FROM FATHER PULIN MARGJOKAJ TO MUSTAFA MERLIKA, NOVEMBER 1956
Graz, November 2, 1952
Most beloved friend,
I did not respond immediately to your card from Niagara Falls, as I thought I would soon also receive the reply to the letter I had sent you in Cannes. But at once, I congratulate you on having arrived safe and sound in the “blessed land,” as you say in your card.
And how are you with your health and all else? Are you content that you left Egypt in time and were not caught in this war that broke out unexpectedly there? Nasser had become a bit too boastful, and I fear now he is falling. But for Egypt, I am not so concerned as I am for the Hungarians, who are in a dire state. For a moment, it seemed as if the people of the counter-revolution had won the cause.
Now, naturally, I fear that Russia is intervening with all the forces at its disposal. And naturally, it is easy for a Russia to subdue a small Hungary. We shall see. If those poor nationalists lost, then thousands upon thousands of freedom fighters are now crossing into Austria, because they hold the entire western part on the border with Austria in their hands. Winter has arrived, and not even barracks can be found immediately for those poor souls crossing the border into Austria.
Here in Graz, we are still the same Albanians as before. Only one has been added, who fled in August with three other companions from Yugoslavia and came out to Austria. All four are Muslims from Kukës and they have told me they are all very good boys and true nationalists.
The one who is here has made a very good impression on me. He found work near Graz. The work is quite tedious – breaking stones – but he is very content and earns 1,200 schillings a month. Under Austrian conditions, this is not a bad wage – 1,200 schillings are about 50 dollars – therefore, that young man is content to have found this work immediately. He has a cousin in New York and hopes that soon he will have the fortune (nafaka) to pass into the Promised Land of America.
For today, I shall leave it at this. I greet you from the heart, you as well as your son and sister. With the most heartfelt wishes for the times to come!
Yours from the heart,
P. Margjokaj O.F.M.
LETTER FROM MUSTAFA MERLIKA TO FATHER PULIN MARGJOKAJ, DECEMBER 1956
544 Seventh Street
Niagara Falls, N.Y., 13-12-1956
Eh, dear friend, here truly is another world and another life! In Bektashi terminology, one should not say “died,” but “changed lives.” Thus, coming to this land is truly like changing lives, and changing lives while still alive is not a very smooth task. You must have known something, you who had no desire to come and live over here.
By this, do not think that I have begun to complain about America. No, I also came knowing the life here in theory – that is, by hearing and reading. In practice, the matter differs. One must have patience until the place makes one its own.
And by the time the place makes me its own; I know well that I shall no longer be here to stay, for in about three months, my age levels at 70. I should have been much younger. But my lot fell in old age, and there is nothing to be done about this, no more than one can do about death. I was accustomed to living a simple “desk life,” with someone coming to tell me “bread is ready,” to receive and see off friends, even when I had nothing for them but bread and salt.
And here, I must fulfill the office of the housewife; while writing this letter to you, I must also keep my mind on another thing – housework or the market. For not only my son, but also my daughter is out at work doing their office hours, for otherwise, life does not move forward here.
Yet, here is the reward that pays for all these changes: I am in my home with my son and daughter by my side, who love and adore me, and who work for themselves and for me; the evening we spend together as our soul’s desire! We are but lone cuckoos regarding Albanians and almost regarding foreign friends. For foreigners, to me, even if there were as many as the sea, it is as if there were none; worse, for I get bored and cannot understand them.
Therefore, dear friend, long letters as before and so frequent you shall no longer expect from me. You shall have them rarely and for the sake of longing. This one I have in hand, first and foremost, shall bring you my most heartfelt wishes for Christmas and the New Year. Secondly, it is also the reply to your two letters: of July 13 and November 2.
You have praised Kërçiku to me as he truly deserves. He is a man who, for his knowledge and qualities, honors himself, his family, his friend, and his place and nation.
The article of mine that you read in Hylli i Dritës (HD), I do not have. I began writing in Albanian newspapers and reviews since 1912 and I have kept nothing of those writings, just as no one has bothered to mention them – except Jokl once, I believe. Yours is a long argument, which we have discussed together other times. But here I must treat it a sommi capi (in broad strokes).
First and foremost, it seems entirely wrong to me “to interpret all the affairs of the Balkans and Albania from a religious side,” if you mean political affairs.
Secondly, to speak only within our narrow circle – that is, the Albanian one – I confirm to you that I have known Albanian Muslims who loved their brother of blood more than the brother of faith who was a foreigner; Muslims who fought with mouth, pen, or rifle against the Turkish ruler for Albanian rights and customs; likewise, there have been Albanian Catholics who preferred and prefer an Albanian Muslim at the head of the rule than a foreign Catholic; and Albanian Orthodox who preferred and prefer a free Albania, even with a Muslim majority, than to be ruled by the Greek, their brother of faith.
What I am saying here is current historical evidence itself. You know that your Father Gjergj [Fishta], and ours of all, wrote that evil came to Albania “since the Turkish Pasha came – and the foreign Bishop.” It is true you are speaking only of Muslims. But why not generalize it? It is more just this way.
But I believe that on one point we are understood: that we speak of the elite category of Albanians, not the masses. For these we shall find everywhere and always on the path of instinct or of those who are more skilled at maneuvering them by touching their most sensitive strings according to the occasion. And among these strings, that of faith is perhaps the most sensitive of all, speaking generally.
Thus, as for the masses, left to their own devices, these would follow faith before nationality. But what faith? Not the authentic faith, as faith truly is, whichever it may be; but as the mass itself has understood it, a faith that fits its customs – that is, as the mass itself has adapted it to these, whether good or bad, compatible with true faith or not.
In my article which you read, I did not aim at Albanians of “very high culture,” nor simply with culture, but Albanians who had opened their eyes in one way or another and were distinguished from the masses, had risen above them. Among these, there were also youths and mature men who fell in patriotic struggles, who rotted in prisons, who suffered in other ways. As for why no one knows them and no one has a good word, even, for them, it is not their fault.
Note that in that period before and after the Turks of which I wrote in HD, Tirana was a part (district, kaza, kajmekamllek) of the circle (prefecture) of Durrës. If I spoke of “Albanians” (patriots) of the Durrës district, look as there is also another writing of mine in the HD collection, one or two I remember well, for they were a polemic with Father Marin Sirdani precisely around the argument we are discussing.
He accused some of the Toptani family of being traitors (not Esat, but others) for some facts that I knew best. In the Durrës district, I spoke of patriots who fought with rifles against Turkey in the Plain of Kruja, inside the city, in Sarisalltik, and in Milot; and against the mass of their own district in Rrashbull for Prince Wied. I am not saying and have not said they performed miracles, but they gave proof that they loved Albania more than Turkey.
They also fought against Esat Toptani. Speaking of these patriots, I did not and do not wish at all to exalt them above those of other regions of Albania. Where more and where less, patriots existed everywhere in Albania. And it must be confessed that everywhere – Muslims, Orthodox, or Catholics – alas for our nation, they were a small minority. It is useless to go further.
Ismail Qemali, as I know him myself having studied his life quite well, was a distinguished patriot. He was able to take money from one State or another to live abroad; not just “able,” but he certainly took it. We were able to criticize this work and even call it a scandal and treason once, when we were still infants in politics – in Albanian politics as well as that of the rest of the world – and when we were still entirely sober in history; but not at this age and after so many famous biographies we have read. Had Ismail Vlora coveted money, he had it by the handful near Sultan Hamid without the trouble of seeking it elsewhere. As for Turkhan Pasha, I only know that he died in misery and neither he nor anyone else ever claimed patriotism for him.
Words that are not written simply for history – and for true history, not for schoolbooks – must be taken and judged according to the circumstances under which they were written and according to the purpose of the writer. Thus, newspaper or review articles shall be taken.
Speaking then in principle and between us, I, like you, have never called patriotism the highest human virtue. I confess to you here just as it comes to me and as I feel my thought upon the highest human virtue: it is the readiness for any sacrifice that may serve a human good. I do not know if it is a clear definition. Here the adjective “human” must be taken in the sense of the individual as well as of people and of all humanity. The effective application of Christian love (carità cristiana) to the point of complete self-denial would perhaps have the same meaning. But there I have no reason to touch with you.
From what results to me from my readings, all monotheistic faiths have the same stance toward nationality and thus also the homeland. Therefore, it is useless to make distinctions. Every faith that recognizes a single God will call all people who adore that God brothers and cannot distinguish them by the language they speak or the customs they have. And vice versa – I am not saying the faith, but the believers of a faith, whichever it may be – recognize each other as brothers, but not those of other faiths. In short, beliefs aim at universal brotherly love, not national divisions; they aim at the heavenly exaltation of all humanity, not the earthly miseries created by the development of society.
Of the books you requested from me, I have hope for Gjorgjeviq in Albanian; indeed, I am sure I shall find it for myself and for you. When I published that translation in Zadar, I sent some 500 copies here to be sold. I received no money and, as you see, I myself have remained without a single copy. The man who took them to sell, thanks be to God for him, is still alive. I have exchanged greetings and a letter with him, but the matter of the books has remained pending. That gentleman lives there near Washington, so about 12 hours away from me. I hope to go there toward spring.
The book of documents I had sent to a companion in Italy for a consultation. He is now in this land like me and one day he will surely return it to me. But I have, once it is returned; only that one copy and I have nowhere else to find another. Of Lumo Skëndo’s, I have never had any book in exile. And I do not know who spoke to you of it, for I did not.
And there is no more room for anything else. Therefore, I extend my hand across the ocean to you and say may you remain well with all good things./Memorie.al
Mustafa
Graz, January 18, 1957
To be continued in the next issue
