Mawrdew Czgowchwz (28 page)

The first, in ruby, proclaimed the wedlock of the noun and the verb. The second, veiled in divers tones of the emblematic Czgowchwz color, kept repeating Jameson's own first words in his own voice. The third, the yellow didact, transformed Jameson's words into flesh. The fourth shone green, announcing words that contain their opposites, resolving them at the liquid center of formal intention. The fifth, garbed in forthright blue, presented the words in a pattern of intentional sounds, aspiring to the condition of music. The sixth, the indigoferous, the illative, dharma shade, the tantric, insisted the words go galloping—winding on and on until
the words said the reader
. The majestic, purpled seventh came through at the precise moment of the first light, silent at first, then, assuming audible force, repeating Jameson's words over and over again until, dissolving into the first dawning mist (the while the other figures fell away in shadows and the unheeding dancers dancing the Madison rollicked on), it chanted: “To turn about, to abstract, to salute, to celebrate.” Apostrophe! Apostrophe! Apostrophe! Apostrophe! Jameson began to write, sitting there, looking.

At breakfast, sitting in little groups under the trees in a blissful Libra morning, they listened to Elgar's
Enigma Variations
—that music Jacob felt he somehow owned—played in the Music Grove under Creplaczx's baton, to perfection.

A fleet of hansom cabs drew up at the aforeset time to transport Mawrdew Czgowchwz, Jacob Beltane, and all their friends down Fifth Avenue to the Plaza, then westward along Central Park South to Broadway, then down Broadway to Thirty-ninth Street—circling the opera house—then north again to Forty-second Street, then west to the river, then north again to Pier 92, where the
Arcadia
sat docked.

They stood together at the stern, watching the city recede on the horizon until it sank like the Kingdom of Ys. The Atlantic, bearing them afloat as if aloft, spread out on all sides. The day drifted along in dream time. At sunset they were seen still together at the oval stern of the
Arcadia
, leaning on the taffrail, feeling apotheosized, looking back westward.

“You are my whole desire, Maev.”

“And you are Jacob, the supplanter, my own.”

“You speak of experience.”

“As you speak, for the first time.”

The flambant sun slipped into the Atlantic, seemingly benignly, leaving them in the stillness and splendor of a seaborne twilight, awaiting the shadows, the stars, the moon, and the night. They sailed away together.

Their time was time out of mind.

This Is a New York Review Book

Published by The New York Review of Books

435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014

www.nyrb.com

Copyright © 1971, 1973, 1975 by James McCourt

Introduction copyright © 2002 by Wayne Koestenbaum

Grateful acknowledgment is made for the use of
Artemis, Acrobats, Divas, and Dancers
(detail of
Diva
), an original mosaic artwork © by Nancy Spero, commissioned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority/Arts for Transit and owned by MTA New York City Transit.
Cover design: Katy Homans

The Library of Congress has cataloged the earlier printing as follows:

McCourt, James, 1941–

  Mawrdew Czgowchwz / James Mccourt ; introduction by Wayne Koestenbaum.

    p. cm.

  ISBN 0-940322-97-8 (pbk. : alk. paper)

  1. Women singers—Fiction. 2. New York (N.Y.)—Fiction. 3.

Metropolitan Opera (New York, N.Y.)—Fiction. 4. Contraltos—Fiction.

5. Opera—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3563.A266 M38 2002

  813'.54—dc21

2001008126

eISBN 978-1-59017-540-8
v1.0

For a complete list of books in the NYRB Classics series, visit
www.nyrb.com
or write to:
Catalog Requests, NYRB, 435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014