From Sokrat Shyti
Part Thirty-Three
Memorie.al / The writer Sokrat Shyti is the “great unknown” who, in recent years, has shown the tip of the iceberg of his literary creation. I say this based on the limited number of his published books in recent years, primarily the voluminous novel “Phantom Night” (Tirana 2014). The novels: “BEYOND THE MYSTERY,” “BETWEEN TEMPTATION AND WHIRLPOOL,” “DIGGING OF NIGHTMARES,” “THE SHADOW OF SHAME AND DEATH,” “COLONEL THE HEAD OF THE MOUNTAINS,” “THE HOPES OF DOWNTRODDEN,” “THE TURBULENCES OF FATE” I, II, “SURVIVAL IN THE COW SHED,” as well as other works, all novels ranging from 350 to 550 pages, are in manuscript form waiting to be published. The dreams and initial enthusiasm of the young novelist, who returned from studying abroad filled with energy and love for art and literature, were cut short early on by the ruthless blade of the communist dictatorship.
Who is Sokrat Shyti?
Returned from studies at the State University of Moscow, shortly after the interruption of Albanian-Soviet relations in 1960, Sokrat Shyti worked at Radio “Diapazon” (which at that time was located on Kavaja Street), in a newsroom with his journalist friends – Vangjel Lezho and Fadil Kokomani – both of whom were later arrested and subsequently executed by the communist regime. In addition to the radio, 21-year-old Sokrat had passionate literary interests at that time. He wrote his first novel “Madam Doctor” and was on the verge of publication, but… alas! Immediately after the arrest of his friends, as if to fill the cup, a painter brother of his fled abroad.
Sokrat was arrested in September 1963, and in November of that year, he was interned along with his family (his mother and younger sister) in a place between Ardenica and Kolonje of Lushnje. For 27 consecutive years, the family lived in a cow shed made of reeds, without windows, while Sokrat was subjected to forced labor. Throughout these 27 years, he was legally required to report three times a day to the local authority. He had no right to leave the place of internment and was deprived of all types of documents, etc. Under these conditions, amid a cow shed, he gave birth to and raised his children. It is precisely from this event, or rather a very long history of persecution, that he based his book “Survival in the Cow Shed”!
Agron Tufa
Continued from the previous number
EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK, “SURVIVAL IN THE COW SHED”
“No matter how kind-hearted and willing the First Secretary is to take actions in favor of the citizen, which leave deep marks, he still cannot cross the permitted limit as the main leader of the district. Especially in this specific case, which contradicts the decision of the Government Commission. Because above all, he cares for his head and will protect his position. Therefore, I say with complete conviction that there is something in this…!” he repeated. “Because even the simplest logic does not accept going against everyone…!”
– “But the fact is, it came out! – I objected. – And he clearly explained his stance: one should not treat a family that has helped the National Liberation Movement in every way by punishing us with inhumane forms, such as residing in a cow shed, knowing that the members are completely innocent! Therefore, he also gave a serious warning to the head of the Internal Affairs Department, who did not show vigilance in implementing the punishment measure…”!
– “In what sense did he not show vigilance? I asked you a little earlier, but you didn’t respond: how do you know such delicate details? – he interrupted me, annoyed. From the direct verbal confirmation of the assistant to the First Secretary. The decision does not mention either the place of punishment, Ardenica, or the cow shed! A careful reading is enough to grasp the nefarious behind-the-scenes actions that, during the execution of this decision, there were malicious interventions ordered by someone, certainly with a devilish intent, so that we would never raise our heads.
Considering this reasoning, the clear mind of comrade Qemal not only did not go against the Decision, but pointed out what filthy atrocities have been committed against our family. Uncovering this injustice, which, if not corrected, would lead me to horrifically destructive consequences, became the main impetus to say stop to inhumane treatment.
And it was not satisfied only with describing the dark side of the brutal mistreatment, at the terrifying shelter, which he called a cave, but projected my future. The only way to remove the terrifying label of ‘declassed’ was to engage in intellectual work, as this is viewed favorably in our society. Based on this practical perspective, he made the clear decision; I should settle into education! This is also the second major announcement that separates me from the clutches of survival!”…
– “These are really wonderful news!… – said my amazed brother. – Then we must find a way to thank comrade Qemal, keeping in mind that in our time, few dare and have the sensitivity to provide their assistance to correct such a barbaric injustice!”… – he added, sighing.
– “You’re right. Fortunately, this opportunity came up on its own!”… – I said. (And I explained how I went to the office of his assistant, to clarify something, when suddenly, a benevolence appeared with the full majesty of the spirit, who graciously invited me to the cabinet). – There, he informed me of his decision for me to work in education. But first, he pointed out the most challenging part, the unusual overload: nearly three times the weekly norm, ten daily preparations, that is, ten journals every day, because I would teach in the high school with and without interruption from work, without parallel classes!
“And all this overload, with more than two extra weekly norms, will be faced by me, without any salary supplement!… He then told me that he met his friend in Tirana, Shevqet Musaraj, who informed him about the manuscript of the novel ‘Madam Doctor’ and expressed regret that he couldn’t help me in this regard…”!
– “Is there any greater help than this?”! – said my astonished brother.
– “What he meant was that teaching is truly valued as an honorable duty and has a decent salary to live on. But due to the specific conditions of overload, with three times the weekly norm, it takes away all my time, leaving me not a single free minute to engage in literature,” – I explained to show how far-sighted and benevolent he was toward me.
– “Did you ever think that in the future you could work in education?” – my brother asked me.
– “To dream of such a thing while you are a fuel porter means that the first signs of madness have begun to show, and slowly you are becoming like Don Quixote in your thoughts!”… – I replied with a smile.
– “Today for me seems to be a day of great tidings…” – my brother said, raising his glass of raki. – “But what about the third announcement?… – he added after taking a sip. If it hadn’t been for the fundamental turnaround, finding a normal shelter and the decision for employment in education, the third announcement would have remained a repressed desire…”!
– “Then it must be a passionate love for a girl?” – he snatched the words from my mouth. (I nodded). – “And if she’s from Lushnja, I must know her…” – he added curiously.
– “Do you remember the youngest girl in the cultural brigades of children, the one who did acrobatics?… To make it clearer who she is, I just need to say she is the first cousin of Thoma Tusha, whom you know from nearby, since you are almost of the same age, and back then she was active in the choir of the House of Culture.”
– “Oh, I know her! I don’t know how many times we’ve created a ruckus and clinked glasses in the club!… I also know her father, uncle Gaqi. So your bride is the daughter of uncle Zoi. Did I hit the mark?” – he asked, pleased. – “How did you two get together?! Because you were in the village, while she was in the city!”…
– “The amateur theater became the connecting link,” – I replied with a smile. – “It became the initiator that my name went into comrade Qemal’s cabinet…!” (And I recounted the entire history of the role replacement in the play “Foreign Hearth”).
– “Does she act in theater too?” – he asked with interest.
– “She has the role of the aristocratic mother, while I play her son,” – I added.
– “I have in mind the drama and the characters,” – he said.
– “But you still don’t know that I do the makeup for the characters?”
– “Really?!… For the first time, this talent has appeared in you?!”
– “Maybe it can be called an immediate awakening of some nerves in my nervous system, which have been activated vigorously after such a long repression, when I wandered the fields alone with a can of oil on my shoulder…” – I replied with a deep sigh.
– “And in the hearth of love, a five-hundred-watt lamp was lit!” – my brother added.
– “It was lit inside, but it didn’t show outside! Because I faced an irreconcilable contradiction between feeling and fulfilling desire. It would have been unforgivable of me to reveal to her a secret that shouldn’t be told. If all those changes hadn’t happened for the better, that you heard about, my inner feeling would have remained silent.”
– “So, comrade Qemal also turns out to be the crowner of your love!… – said my brother. – It seems to be an interesting subject for a drama! Why not write it?”… – he added.
– “At first, it’s important to bring it to life, and then to put it on paper,” – I replied.
– “Was she or you the initiator?” – my brother wanted to know.
– “Neither I nor she, but something in between…” – I added.
– “What do you mean by in between, I don’t understand?”… – he added, confused.
– “More precisely, I should say that the request for engagement suddenly appeared in the girl’s family… (And I briefly described the sharp friction between the family council and the girl’s firm opposition) – Under these circumstances, she was compelled to state the true reason for her refusal…”!
– “But Thomai joined the common choir?” – my brother asked.
– “Naturally joined, because he couldn’t oppose. Which parent or relative would accept their daughter from the family to get engaged and married to a boy who has neither a house nor a shelter, especially since he works as a porter and carries the burden of being ‘declassed’?”!
– “I’m increasingly convinced that this real subject serves as powerful material for a drama!” – my thoughtful brother repeated.
– “If it bothers you so much, you can write it, I said. – But great care must be taken with the extension of tensions, from the family to society, because socialist realism does not accept a First Secretary of the Party as a protector of a ‘declassed’ person, especially since he dares to openly oppose the decision of the Government Commission, furthermore exposing and discovering the malicious misuse of the Decision by some anonymous individuals. The fact that the essence of this event carries within itself the spark of such a powerful drama, filled with intrigue and terrifying traps, raises a frightening doubt for us: is this piece allowed to be displayed on our stage?”
– “You are very right,” – my brother admitted. – “This idea must be studied first from the perspective of class struggle. What I like about you is that you’re not rushing. How many authors have suffered just when someone has ‘discovered’ a doubled punchline?!”
– “From my previous experience, I have come to this conclusion: if you don’t feel yourself to be a product of this method, remain silent, don’t write. Because inadvertently, somewhere between the lines, you will express your disagreement with the fabricated reality.”
– “Have you decided not to write? Will you give up literature?” – my brother asked.
– “The overload of nearly three norms a week will take away every free minute I have. This fact is enough to convince myself why I can’t write. For me, it’s important to emphasize the difference: ‘I can’t’ versus ‘I don’t want to’. Because ‘I don’t want to’ automatically creates a terrifying doubt of revenge. Meanwhile, with ‘I can’t’, my adversaries take pleasure, seeking to destroy me as a creator.”
– “Do you have the strength within you to face this painful repression of the spirit?”… – my brother asked, worried.
– “Considering the overload, averaging 30 diary pages every day, I say I won’t have time even to read artistic literature, let alone dedicate myself to literary creation. Thus, the flame of creativity will naturally extinguish. The transition from forced survival to life requires sacrifice from anyone, first and foremost the renunciation of the dream of being someone.”
– “What do you think: shall we have another shot, since it’s pure grape raki?”… – my brother added when he noticed the empty glasses.
– “It depends on you: If you’re free and have no obligations, the proposal seems appropriate to me,” – I replied. And I immediately signaled to the waiter, raising my glass high, for him to repeat the order.
– “As for the moment we are talking, how far has the swift development reached? I mean about our families…” – my brother expressed interest.
– “The first step was taken by both: she came to the House of Retë, met and spoke calmly with my mother. Upon returning, when I walked her to her yard, she asked me to come inside to ease her mother’s mind.”
– “A fair request. How did your mother-in-law welcome you?” – he asked me curiously.
– “At first with reproaches and harsh remarks. In the end with two kinds of sweet honey candies!” – I replied with a smile.
– “And what does your mother think about the further progress?” – he wanted to know.
– “The engagement should take place as soon as possible! The same thing Stavri said. Because after such a harsh friction, there is no point in dragging it out.”
– “That’s fair, very fair,” – my brother repeated. – “And how do you envision it?”
– “The ceremony will be carried out according to tradition: you two, the elders of the parental family, certainly as a couple, Dhora, I, and one of your children, who will hold the suitcase with the gifts, will go to her house to ask for her hand. That’s what my mother said.”
– “When is the engagement expected to take place?” – he asked.
– “We haven’t set an exact date yet. But both parties agreed on the month of March…” – I added.
– “As the eldest, it is my duty to raise the first toast for my younger brother’s engagement!” – he said, raising his glass. – “Life seems very surprising and strange to us at times: a single event freezes the relationships among the members of the parental family, as if polar ice has descended here! And after some time, the same warmth of the tropics comes, melting the ice and bringing us closer together!”… – he added with tearful eyes.
At that moment, his tears seemed like a symbol of remorse towards himself, for not having made even the slightest effort to see our mother once during these years in the cow shed, even though there were several occasions and opportunities when he traveled to Fier. It would have sufficed for him to stop for a few minutes to embrace her and tell her: don’t scold me for not having appeared here!
What matters is that in spirit and mind, I am always close to you. But even after this reasoning, it still seemed pointless to blame my older brother after such a long separation for his cold demeanor. Because sound judgment clearly explained to me that the frostiness had occurred due to the failure of the blood call to reach his consciousness, as it collided against the thick wall of fear and turned back.
Therefore, during these years he had suffered from depression, becoming a shadow of threats that followed him everywhere. Even when he lay down to sleep, they would appear in his dreams to repeat the same threat: if your foot dares to step into the cow shed, know that you too will go close to them! Therefore, the attempts to encourage himself, to find sufficient strength to drive away the threatening shadows, always remained halfway; his power would wither, and he would see very despairingly the opposite: that the shadows mocked him, telling him he was a coward, that he couldn’t even squeeze a tomato, let alone challenge our dark force that could bring doom!
Meanwhile, in the morning, as he was going to work, it seemed to him that he would confront the living shadows that emerged from the ministry checkpoint, some of whom greeted and honored him. He himself did not understand why every action of theirs appeared to him as having threatening dimensions, specifically designed to remind him of the terrible doom, and his ears rang with the awful screams that ordered him to remain crouched inside the shell of fear, daring not to step outside this uncomfortable shield for even a minute.
Getting tangled up hour by hour in the shadows of this constant fright, his mind fell prey to the paralysis of general numbness, losing the ability to use practical judgment, so much so that it seemed completely impossible for him to approach a few friendly officers from the theater, personal supporters of his roles, to discuss with them the problems of stage art. And when they invited him for coffee at the Ministry of the Interior club, it required tact and caution to start a social conversation about what troubled him, a first test to see if anyone was willing to help him.
Then, in the next meeting, he could wittily ask how long he should stay away from his family (mother, brother, sister), since they had left Tirana not due to their fault. This intervention would provide an opportunity for the admirer to express a desire to help, starting with the simplest request: to secure permission to visit his mother. (For this procedure, the older brother must be aware of it, just as it is commonly used for visiting prisoners, except in cases where they are held in isolated cells).
I had no doubt that my older brother knew about this possibility, but he stayed away from this request due to the threat and terror of the cow shed, as a completely unique form of punishment that could only be compared to the isolated cell of prison, where it is not possible to visit its inhabitants. Having as the backbone of his reasoning this thought, he viewed his hesitation as the most practical and suitable measure within legal norms, supported by the judgment that generally, self-restraint is valued, not considered reprehensible behavior, regardless of later ancillary actions that cause us to feel guilt within our conscience.
From this perspective, the tears at the end of the meeting could be seen as a form of spontaneous remorse, comparing his fleeting stance with that of the First Secretary of the district, who, although he had no blood relations with the punished in the cow shed, took on an extremely bold and heavy burden, breaking the taboo of the Government Commission’s decision on Internment-Expulsions. He opposed all the important officials of the district, astonishing the chairman of the Executive Committee with the unprecedented act of sheltering a declassed family in normal conditions, appointing the fuel porter, the former journalist of the Radio, in education!
Therefore, my brother remained bewildered for several minutes, with a look of astonishment and disbelief when he heard the astonishing human announcement! Because he could not believe that the main leader of the district had shown such generosity and altruism, publicly displaying a marvelous virtue at a time heavily burdened with the pressure of annihilation. He dared to showcase the dignity of a liberal intellectual, one of the rare phenomena, the antithesis of the cruelty and malevolence of the secretaries he had known while working as an instructor in the Party Committee!
Through bold decisions and actions, he showed the petty party members and rulers that the injustice wrought with diabolical intent could be liberated from dark aspirations to blacken someone’s life, if the rival in every area of life is always seen with human eyes, as a competitor and contender, without ever thinking of conspiring or making malicious attempts to isolate him in quarantine, with the intent to obstruct and hinder creative opportunities and abilities./Memorie.al
Continued in the next issue
