The Invention of Solitude

following the same route that had taken him there in reverse. At some point along the way he stopped to drink a glass of beer. Then he continued on his walk. It was nearly twelve when he opened the door of his room.
    That night, for the first time in his life, he dreamed that he was dead. Twice he woke up during the dream, trembling with panic. Each time, he tried to calm himself down, told himself that by changing position in bed the dream would end, and each time, upon falling back to sleep, the dream started up again at precisely the spot it had left off.
    It was not exactly that he was dead, but that he was going to die. This was certain, an absolute and immanent fact. He was lying in a hospital bed, suffering from a fatal disease. His hair had fallen out in patches, and his head was half bald. Two nurses dressed in white walked into the room and told him: “ Today you are going to die. It ’ s too late to help you. ” They were almost mechanical in their indifference to him. He cried and pleaded with them, “ I ’ m too young to die, I don ’ t want to die now. ” “ It ’ s too late, ” the nurses answered. “ We have to shave your head now. ” With tears pouring from his eyes, he allowed them to shave his head. Then they said: “ The coffin is over there. Just go and lie down in it, close your eyes, and soon you ’ ll be dead. ’’ He wanted to run away. But he knew that it was not permitted to disobey their orders. He went over to the coffin and climbed into it. The lid was closed over him, but once in side he kept his eyes open.
    Then he woke up for the first time.
    After he went back to sleep, he was climbing out of the coffin. He was dressed in a white patient ’ s gown and had no shoes on. He left the room, wandered for a long time through many corridors, and then walked out of the hospital. Soon afterwards, he was knocking on the door of his ex-wife ’ s house. “ I have to die today, ” he told her, “ there ’ s nothing I can do about it. ” She took this news calmly, acting much as the nurses had. But he was not there for her sympathy. He wanted to give her instructions about what to do with his manuscripts. He went through a long list of his writings and told her how and where to have each of them published. Then he said: “ The Book of Memory isn ’ t finished yet. There ’ s nothing I can do about it. There won ’ t be time to finish. You finish it for me and then give it to Daniel. I trust you. You finish it for me. ” She agreed to do this, but without much enthusiasm. And then he began to cry, just as he had before: “ I ’ m too young to die. I don ’ t want to die now. ” But she patiently explained to him that if it had to be, then he should accept it. Then he left her house and returned to the hospital. When he reached the parking lot, he woke up for the second time.
    After he went back to sleep, he was inside the hospital again, in a basement room next to the morgue. The room was large, bare, and white, a kind of old-fashioned kitchen. A group of his childhood friends, now grownups, were sitting around a table eating a large and sumptuous meal. They all turned and stared at him when he entered the room. He explained to them: “ Look, they ’ ve shaved my head. I have to die today, and I don ’ t want to die. ” His friends were moved by this. They invited him to sit down and eat with them. “ No, ” he said, “ I can ’ t eat with you. I have go to into the next room and die. ” He pointed to a white swinging door with a cir cular window in it. His friends stood up from their chairs and joined him by the door. For a little while they all reminisced about their childhood together. It soothed him to talk to them, but at the same time he found it all the more difficult to summon the courage to walk through the door. Finally, he announced: “ I have to go now. I have to die now. ” One by one, with tears pouring down his cheeks, he embraced his friends, squeezing them with all his strength, and said good-bye. Then he woke up for the last time.
     
    Concluding sentences for The Book of Memory.
    From a letter by Nadezhda Mandelstam to Osip Mandelstam, dated 10/22/38, and never sent.
“I have no words, my darling, to write this letter… I am writing it into empty space. Perhaps you will come back and not find me here. Then this will be all you have left to remember me by …. Life can last so long. How hard and long for each of us to die alone. Can this