The Lore of the Dark WorldОдно из моих англоязычных сочинений жанра "фентези".

Желали что-либо на английском языке, да?



Вот, ниже для эксперимента.

Это небольшой рассказик жанра "фентези", написанный мной в 1997 году. Он неокончен, как и большинство моих сочинений, и обрывается на полуслове. Несмотря на своё зловещее название ("Предание тёмного мира"), он, на мой взгляд, по духу светлый, просто очень грустный. Сочинил я его почти с натуры -- лишь перенёс на фантастическую "иноземную" почву, а два его главных героя имеют вполне настоящие, реальные человеческие прототипы. То был очень тяжкий в моральном отношении для меня период, когда буквально физически ощущалось, что вокруг нет ничего кроме тьмы. По этой же причине я не хочу его переводить. Иностранный язык -- это, своего рода, психологический барьер, отделяющий и защищающий твой внутренний мир от прикосносновения к нему из-вне, но в то же время и передающий суть и смысл твоих переживаний читателю.

Я не показывал его никогда никому из носителей английского языка, поэтому не знаю, как он -- речь там не шекспировская безусловно и, как говорится, "в меру моей испорченности", но я старался и вроде бы, ничего, неплохо. Если заметите вопиющие ошибки, то просьба сообщить...

Вобщем, чисто для эксперимента пока публикую ниже. Не знаю, заинтересует он кого-либо или нет, но Леонид обмолвился недавно по поводу английских публикаций, и я подумал: может пригодится, мало ли?





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THE LORE OF THE DARK WORLD

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....It was the time when all men lived in the shade of darkness and the eternal red light of descent reigned over their world. They did not know the real light and thought that what they saw was the light, and believed that there was no life outside of the darkness. They ran their businesses, worked and raised their children, bought and sold, died and were born, and even considered themselves happy if one could only manage to catch a bit more red light than others. And such was their life and not a single person could imagine anything else, since imagination comes from memory, and they did not have any. For that was the world of oblivion, the land of those who had forgotten themselves.

Nobody could help them for those having memory were no longer born in their world and those who used to visit them from other worlds as messengers or occasional wanderers had not been understood as they talked of things beyond visible.

And it came to pass, that a certain lone traveller, who in virtue of freakish circumstances of his life had found himself in the world of darkness, felt sympathy for its unhappy people, and tried to tell them the story of their world so that they could recall their memories and wish for the light. But futile appeared to be all his attempts, for the inhabitants of the world of darkness did not want to listen to his story as it seemed to be long and they liked rather to keep their businesses running than waste their time on useless fables. So, finally, the traveller became very sad and said in his heart: "These poor people do not know the beauty of the light and I have the word of truth towards them and yet nobody listens to me". And then in the depth of his sadness a thought had suddenly slipped into his mind and he heard it as a certain voice saying, "Then write this story for them so that anyone can read it in his good time". And he set about writing the history of the world. But it came to pass that when the book had been finished and offered to people no one of them, living under the red light, showed however the slightest piece of interest for it, as it was telling about the things mysterious and they did not believe in mysteries. And again the unlucky traveller became very sad and again did he say in his heart: "Behold, now I have put everything that can make them happy on paper and again nobody is going to incline his ear to the voice of wisdom. They do not want to read me the same as formerly they did not want to listen to me". And as the previous time, a new thought had come into his mind. "If these poor people who have lost not only their memory but even the very wish to think about it do not want to open the cover of your book, let it stand in front of their eyes open. Take a big stone and carve the words of their history on its surface and put the stone in the centre of the main square in their largest city so that anyone passing by can read the words inscribed on it". And again he set about his work. And since it was going to take a lot longer time and more strengths than the previous task he retreated from the city into a far off and desolate place and in silence and solitude laboured there. And a day came and a night made its turn, but he still kept working and the sounds of his hammer were heard all around as he engraved the words of the dark world's history upon the surface of the stone.

But the time went by and the desolate place, which the traveller had chosen for doing his job, little by little began to fill up with people. Out of remote cities and villages, valleys and mountains were they coming there, for the rumour had spread throughout the land that there was more red light falling onto that place.

And they set their abodes and established their businesses, made roads and built factories so that finally the traveller, working upon his stone, found himself in the centre of a big city. But the people, surrounding him, paid almost no attention to what he was doing as being mainly preoccupied with their own. Only one little girl glanced from time to time upon his work, although she was too young and could not read yet that to understand what had been engraved on the stone. She was completely alone and, according to an unwritten custom among the people of the land of darkness, no one was going to take care of her. And having seen her watch him, the traveller once had thought, "Behold, these people, to whom I am preparing the word of wisdom do not even wish to take a peek at what I am doing and this little girl who can neither read nor write is the only one sharing however a few minutes of my labour".

Since already a long time had passed as the traveller had started writing on the stone the dark world's history he had grown older and a lot weaker than he used to be at the beginning, and therefore every time he needed to take longer and longer rest to recover his strengths. At one of such moments when in exhaustion he had laid down his tools she asked him:

"Why are you so sad? And what are you doing with this stone stamping strange signs on it whilst all people work for their profit and try to get more red light?"

"What do you know about it, child?", - the traveller answered, -"These people are not aware of what the real light is, for they have no memory, but this stone is to reveal it to them one day so they can regain their sight".

The girl looked at him in surprise.

"Who is such that doesn't know what light is?", - she said, - "Just take a look at the sky, - is it not full of light?"

"This light", - the traveller answered, - "Is not real, though all people of this world think it is. Have you ever been in a cavern or in the dark rooms that are in every house beneath the level of the ground?"

"Yes", - the girl said.

"What did you feel coming out of there back to the surface?"

"I felt it was bright and plenty of room and warm outside."

"This is what everyone feels coming out of your world into the true light", - the traveller said.

Then he resumed his work again and the girl said to him no word. For a week or two he had not seen the girl and even began to miss her, but one day she came back to him again and she looked pensive and sad.

"The words you have spoken to me do not leave my mind", - said she, - "Do you truly know what you are talking about? That place full of light, compared to which our world seems to be but a dark dungeon?"

"Oh, yes!" - the traveller exclaimed, -"Who else could have known it here if not me? For I was born there and lived there and was happy."

"Why then do you live here now?", - The girl asked in surprise.

And having laid off his hammer and chisel he began to tell her the story of the dark world, not remembering itself, about the red light of the sun that once had set behind the horizon and never risen again, about the people who did not know what dawn was, about the children doomed never to play in daylight.

"And every time", - he went on, - "When people immerse into their cares so deeply that they no longer remember what they truly are the world moves yet another step further from the sun and, thus, the absolute darkness may soon cover the whole land, and the people will see the light of the sun no more."

"What a horrible story!", - the girl exclaimed, - "What if the people will never recall their memories?... It will be then eternal night in the world!"

"This stone soon will have all the world's history written on its surface and I will place it onto the main square of this city so that the people may read and know."

"But what if they won't? Or having read, will not understand or, having understood, will not wish to change anything?"

"Then", - said the traveller gravely, - "They will see the reproach of their ignorance and imprudence in front of their eyes."

A few minutes passed in silence and the traveller was already about to continue his work when he saw the girl come closer to him and speak in a quiet voice:

"Traveller", - said she, - "But if this happens, if the world is doomed to perish in darkness you will die too. There will be no escape for anyone."

These words, spoken in undertone, almost in a whisper, sounded like a thunder to the old traveller's heart, for that was the thing he dreaded and tried to keep out of his mind as far as he could, and that yet from time to time, at especially hard moments, was coming back and knocking on the door of his soul as a reminder of the inevitable and terrible. For the further this world moved away from the sun and the older the traveller grew, the more and more difficult the way back for him became. And no one could say in that time whether there still existed a path leading to where he came from. Yet a slight piece of hope still lingered in his heart that as long as he kept remembering his native land the door would not shut altogether. And that hope always dispersed his sorrow and gave him strengths to go on with his labour.

Therefore the traveller answered with all the confidence he was only capable of:

"I shall find the way home when this work is accomplished."

Having heard that, a shining idea that was born in the depth of the girl's heart some time before, but lived there for a while untold, had suddenly flared up as a real hope.

"Traveller", - said she, - "If you know the way to the land, which your heart so much yearns after, and if someday you will set off there, take me with you, for since I have met you and heard your stories I've started dreaming of light and wishing to be where it is in abundance."

He raised his eyes upon her and an unusual feeling had suddenly caught him: "If I take her with me", - did he think - "and bring her into the world of the everlasting light, will it not be greater than all this long and tiresome labour? For isn't a single, but really happy soul, worth hundreds and thousands of those who do not even wish to hear of happiness?"

"I must find the way back no matter what", - he said to himself, - "I must finish this work as soon as I can for the world has moved and the price is already paid."

And he answered to the girl:

"Child, I promise you not to leave until you come with me."

Since that day the traveller began to work as twice as fast, for he wanted to accomplish his task before it was too late. But despite all his efforts the work was to take quite some time and more than once he thought of giving it up, for he already did not believe then in the success of his luckless undertaking. The girl grew older and though at the beginning she frequently came to visit the traveller and even helped him in his labour, after a while she began to appear all rarer and rarer. And it deeply afflicted him because now he felt himself lonesome and abandoned.

The day, however, came when the great work was finally all finished. And the traveller felt happy, for now he might return home with pure conscience. He did not bother himself anymore with thoughts of whether the people of the dark world would read their history, nor whether would they ever recall their memory, but only wanted to find that girl who used to come to him and take her away. So, once at night having loaded his stone on a wooden cart he brought it to the large square in the very centre of the city, lowered it onto the ground and went away having not even glanced back upon his creation. He felt himself free and as if as twice as younger and the confidence of the former times that the road back to his native world remained always open had returned to him. If only he could find that girl, the one who so passionately wished to go with him, who hitherto had been the first and the only person that believed him. But where was she? How could he know where to look for her? For the first time he noticed that the entire great city built around was utterly unknown to him -- so deeply was he absorbed by his work, and thus he did not remember neither the place where she lived in nor even the direction she used to come from. So, having walked all night in vain the traveller had finally decided to return to his dwelling place and wait until the girl herself would show up for such was his promise - not to leave until she came with him.



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And so he waited days and nights, weeks and months, but the girl was not coming. And he did not know that the people of the city had already noticed his stone and were in great astonishment and confusion, for no one knew what to make out of it. Many said they should remove or destroy the stone since it was too large and occupied too much space on the square. Others tried to guess where it had appeared from and just a few curious attempted to read out the text inscribed on it. But almost all of them soon gave up because the lifetime, as they liked to say, was short and there was absolutely no point in wasting it on things idle and inane.

But it came to pass, however, that some of the people who either had nothing yet to lose or who, perhaps, had already lost everything, gathered from time to time beside the stone and read. And the lore of the dark world gradually began to spread all over the land. But the lonesome traveller was unaware of all that and, seeing no changes in the world surrounding him, grew all more and more convinced in the unsuccess of his deed. And once at the minute of such heavy thoughts he said to himself, "Here, in this unhappy world have I lost everything. Whatever I did or do is doomed to fail. I wished to reveal to the people the truth of the light and had done a terrible job, which took almost all my strengths and almost all the time of my life and nothing has changed as though I have never started my labour. In the end I was lucky to meet a wonderful girl that was the only one in this whole world who answered my words and desired to go with me to the realm of light and now she is gone as though has never been."



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And once having opened his eyes he beheld a beautiful young woman in road clothes standing nearby and she was looking at him with deep sorrow. Her features seemed familiar to him and since he was dying and desired to see his dreams come true he took her for the girl that many years before used to come to his place and talked to him.

And he said:

"O! My fate has honoured me with her last mercy, - and though I can not die where I was born it sends to me my only friend in this joyless world to relieve however the last minutes of my loneliness."

And the young woman sat at his bed, lowered her head, and clinged to his hand.

"O, traveller! Dear lone traveller!", - exclaimed she with the tears in her voice. "If now I had begged your forgiveness there would be no truth between us, for this is my guilt that you are dying here alone, and never my heart will find repose. But I am glad to find you still alive and say that I have always remembered you and loved you. And it has been so not because of that hard work you had done for the people and not even because of the stories of light you had told me, but because you opened me myself. For since that day when our roads had crossed and up until this very hour whatever has happened to me always revealed me what I truly am and now I know firmly what I desire and which way I've got to go."

And though he was hopelessly ill and incredibly weak he had raised up his arm and stroked the girl's hair as she was crying.

"My time here is done", - finally uttered he. "And I am happy to see now that all that has happened to me here, all that I gained or lost in this world means nothing because I have found a friend and the friendship of however two faithful souls spills the grace of the true light even where there has been nothing but darkness before. And I thank you for that you have come, for I did not want to leave this world withought seeing you and knowing how you were, and without... "

/unfinished/

1997.

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Вот такой рассказик...

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