It was shortly after I wrote my letter to Albertine that I went back to work with purpose, instead of merely inhabiting my small laboratory.
Departing from my earlier studies, I investigated the properties of a fungus that can produce protein from pulp. Through long hours of work I discovered that, if the competitors of this fungus are destroyed with heat, it yields a protein-rich mass.
This dense protein is the sepia color of old photographs, the very color of nostalgia. A kilogram of it can replace three kilograms of meat in a human diet.
These not insignificant findings would save, quite directly, lives at the end of at least two famines.
Even now, on cold days when my stomach growls, I tell myself that I have earned my survival. But on hot nights, when I awake in sweat, I know that redemption, if possible, is irrelevant. A man is ruled by appetite and remorse, and I swallowed what I could.
My pantry is full. There are jars filled with different shapes and colors of pasta, with red and brown lentils, with long- and short-grained rice. There are cans of peas, corn, artichokes, mushrooms, white asparagus, and pickled beets. There are cans of pineapple rings and crushed pineapple, cans of peaches, apricots, mandarin oranges, and blackberries. I have, together in a single can, kinds of tropical fruit that are not even grown on the same continent. There are also cans of tuna, salmon, clams, and processed meat. There are boxes of cereal and bouillon cubes. There are packages of raisins and walnuts and almonds and filberts and chocolate candies. I am never without at least several months of provisions.
I reach behind all of this abundance, all of this safety, to a canning jar with a wooden lid. In the jar, I have reproduced each mouthful of food I stole during the winter of hunger. I could not obtain the exact varieties of each kind of seed, of course, but I have put in two tablespoons of a type of teff to represent the teff I ate so secretly in the hallways outside the collection that I was trusted to guard. I have added small handfuls of white Asian rice and nutscented brown rice from Louisiana, some yellow split peas, seven melon seeds, a few sunflower seeds, a quarter cup of amaranth, three tablespoons of millet, and one mango pit.
Unlike the rainbows of seeds and grains I have seen photographed in catalogs, these look more bland than tempting. Together, they do not fill half the jar.
I wonder if such a meager portion could have kept my Alena alive and what it would be like to know her into old age. It is an unbearably sweet thought for an old man who shares his flat with only nonperishable food.
Still, shaking these seeds that mean my life, I see that they are beautiful.
Acknowledgments
This novel was not written without help. I drew historical fact and color from the following excellent books: The 900 Days by Harrison Evans Salisbury; Everyday Stalinism by Sheila Fitzpatrick; The Vavilov Affair by Mark Popovsky; The Lysenko Affair by David Joravsky; The Komarov Institute by Stanwyn Shetler; Babylon by Joan Oates; The Ancient Near East, edited by James B. Pritchard; Daily Life in Ancient Mesopotamia by Karen Rhea Nemet-Nejat; Everyday Life in Babylon and Assyria by Georges Contenau; and Leningrad Diary by Vera Inber, translated by Serge M. Wolff and Rachel Grieve. I also gained information from Web-published material by Barry Mendel Cohen and photographer Ilya Narovlyansky. I got an idea and a reading of Voltaire from Susan Neiman’s terrific book Evil in Modern Thought. The epigraph from Paul Valéry is from The Outlook for Intelligence, translated by Denise Folliot and Jackson Mathews. Throughout the writing, I drew inspiration and information from the publications and important work of the Seed Savers Exchange.
I am grateful to everyone at Little, Brown and Company, especially Michael Pietsch and Asya Muchnick. Thanks to John Ware, friend and fabulous agent. I also thank for their crucial support Meredith Blackwell, other members of my family (including Blackwells, Mays, and Bajos), and my friends. I am indebted to the writing program of the University of California, Irvine, the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, and Princeton University Press. For recognizing in me abilities not necessarily apparent to others, Dan Howell, Patricia Geary, Louis Owens, Paul Majkut, Mary Reardon, and Adam Fortgang deserve special thanks.
Any appreciation I could extend to David Bajo or to Esme Claire Bajo would fall absurdly short. I dedicate this book to them.
About the Author
ELISE BLACKWELL holds an M.F.A. in fiction from the University of California, Irvine, and has worked as an instructor, journalist, freelance writer, and translator. Originally from southern Louisiana, she now lives in Princeton, New Jersey.
Hunger
A novel by
ELISE BLACKWELL
A READING GROUP GUIDE
A CONVERSATION WITH ELISE BLACKWELL
The author of Hunger talks with Matt Borondy, editor of IdentityTheory.com
Hunger, which takes place during World War II, was released as a war was taking place in Iraq. The Philadelphia Inquirer called the book “an inadvertent link to Babylon’s miseries of the moment.” What are the parallels between 1941 Leningrad and 2003 Baghdad, and what can one infer about the struggles of the Iraqi people from reading your book?
The dissimilarities are probably more definitive than any similarities, but there are important parallels. The residents of both cities suffered first from brutal dictatorship and political purges and then from war with an invading army. People in both cities endured the breakdown of order and often decency without accurate information or certainty of outcome. Both had to fear their own leaders and the incoming bombs. Hunger includes several sections about ancient Iraq and the siege of Babylon, in part to comment on what does and does not change about human life with changing leaders and gods — and on the tragedies of mighty civilizations.
What was your reaction to the looting of ancient Mesopotamian artifacts during the Iraq invasion (and the calculated neglect by the armed forces in protecting them), considering that the botanists in your book chose to sacrifice their lives to preserve vital treasures from that same region?
Even beautiful, rare, and ancient things are things, and I would not condemn anyone for pilfering artifacts as a flat matter of survival. But it is a tragedy when human gifts that have survived across generations are disrespected for any reason short of basic survival. To loot artifacts for spending money — or to allow that to happen — is a violation of history.
Had you been in the shoes of the botanists at the institute, would you have eaten from the collection to save your life?