Authors: Norman Mailer
Tags: #Fantasy, #Classics, #Historical, #Science Fiction
Ancient Evenings (112 page)
Now, Honey-Ball and Nefertiri were near, and I climbed as if the arms of Usermare were for my use, and the head of Hera-Ra was like my own. I saw again a vision of great cities to come, and knew the strength of the Ka must be great. For even as the tender force of the flower breaks through the stone, so would the strength of the Ka be immense if its true desire were opposed. And thereby, as I ascended the ladder, I could know the purpose of my Ka by the presence of our strength. So I mounted on this ladder of lights to that place in the heavens where one might gaze like Osiris upon the portents of all that is ahead, and try to turn the storm before it breaks. All the while I knew the fear that I was not pure enough for such a task, nor my great-grandfather, and neither of us could offer a feather to lie upon the heart as nicely as the sense of right and wrong. Then I saw my Ba, saw that small bird whose face was my own face, and I had not seen it since it flew away as my Ka approached its tomb. It was here above me now, the soul of my heart even as the Ka was my Double, and so the Ba could tell me that purity and goodness were worth less to Osiris than strength. Menenhetet would not be used because he was a good man, but because he was a strong one. Indeed, the Lord Osiris might be as desperate as ourselves when it came to choosing His troops. Such was the thought of the Ba, the purest part of my heart.
Yet, my Ka replied that nothing could be worth more to the Ka than to know its purpose, and that I felt by the presence of our strength as I went up the ladder. I think all magic was at my feet. As I climbed, I saw the moon, and Osiris was in it waiting for me, and by either arm was Horus and Set. I was near to the Boat of Ra. All that was in me shifted, even Time itself.
For, now, a comet approaches. I suffer the onslaught of a frightful wind. A pain is coming that will be like no pain felt before. I hear the scream of earth exploding. In this terror, vast as the abyss, I still know more than fear. Here, at the center of pain is radiance. May my hope of heaven now prove equal to my ignorance of where I go. Whether I am the Second or the First Menenhetet, or the creature of our twice seven separate souls and lights, I would hardly declare, and so I do not know if I will labor in greed forever among the demonic or serve some noble purpose I cannot name.
By this I am told that I must enter into the power of the word. For the first sound to come out of the will had to traverse the fundament of pain. So I cry out in the voice of the newly born at the mystery of my first breath, and enter the Boat of Ra.
We sail across dominions barely seen, washed by the swells of time. We plow through fields of magnetism. Past and future come together on thunderheads and our dead hearts live with lightning in the wounds of the Gods.
1972–1982
To my daughters, to my sons, and to Norris
By Norman Mailer
The Naked and the Dead
Barbary Shore
The Deer Park
Advertisements for Myself
Deaths for the Ladies (and Other Disasters)
The Presidential Papers
An American Dream
Cannibals and Christians
Why Are We in Vietnam?
The Deer Park—A Play
The Armies of the Night
Miami and the Siege of Chicago
Of a Fire on the Moon
The Prisoner of Sex
Maidstone
Existential Errands
St. George and the Godfather
Marilyn
The Faith of Graffiti
The Fight
Genius and Lust
The Executioner’s Song
Of Women and Their Elegance
Pieces and Pontifications
Ancient Evenings
Tough Guys Don’t Dance
Harlot’s Ghost
Oswald’s Tale: An American Mystery
Portrait of Picasso as a Young Man
The Gospel According to the Son
The Time of Our Time
The Spooky Art
Why Are We at War?
Modest Gifts
The Castle in the Forest
On God
(with J. Michael Lennon)
Mind of an Outlaw
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Born in 1923 in Long Branch, NJ, and raised in Brooklyn, N
ORMAN
M
AILER
was one of the most influential writers of the second half of the twentieth century and a leading public intellectual for nearly sixty years. He is the author of more than thirty books.
The Castle in the Forest
, his last novel, was his eleventh New York Times bestseller. His first novel,
The Naked and the Dead
, has never gone out of print. His 1968 nonfiction narrative,
The Armies of the Night
, won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. He won a second Pulitzer for
The Executioner’s Song
and is the only person to have won Pulitzers in both fiction and nonfiction. Five of his books were nominated for National Book Awards, and he won a lifetime achievement award from the National Book Foundation in 2005. Mr. Mailer died in 2007 in New York City.
Table of Contents
Dedication
Other Books by This Author
About the Author