Lucie Faulerová
DUST COLLECTORS
(Torst, 2017)
220 pages
Twenty-eight-year-old Anna answers the phone on an information line and lives alone in an apartment full of knickknacks gathering dust. Apart from her sister, Dana, she barely sees anyone else, occupying her time with a stream of sardonic internal dialogue.
Anna is a wounded soul, marked by the trauma of childhod violence. Her father died a sudden death. Was it natural or a murder? If it was murder, was her mother the killer, or Anna herself?
The answer remains a mystery.
Anna’s is not the only voice in the novel addressing the reader. There is also a narrator, and his version of events is always slightly different than the one Anna presents. Maybe he is giving the authoritative account; maybe he is a figment of Anna’s imagination, or the voice of her subconscious? Who knows?
Anna’s thoughts whirl and flare, memories tucked deeply away emerge, punctuated with pangs of conscience and feelings of self-hatred as Anna dies over and over again, the cause of death different each time.
Lucie Faulerová’s novelistic debut was a much-talked-about event on the Czech literary scene, and was nominated for Best Work of Prose in the country’s most prestigious literary awards, the Magnesia Litera. With skill and bravado, the author takes a sideways approach to the theme of guilt and punishment, placing unreliable narration, the manipulation of truth, and the relativity of memory and reality center stage. Faulerová’s protagonist exposes her interior to the reader with a masochistic gusto, holding nothing back. Critics compare her writing to that of star poet Melissa Broder and the feminist theorist and visual artist Audrey Wollen, creator of “Sad Girl Theory.”
The author: Lucie Faulerová
(b. 1989) graduated in Czech studies from Palacký University in Olomouc, where she is currently a postgraduate student in literary theory. She works as a curator of cultural events and cooperates with the conceptual artist Kateřina Šedá. She is also an editor of the literary magazine Aluze and works as a freelance editor and proofreader.
BRNOX: A Guide to Brno’s Bronx (2016), about a socially disadvantaged neighborhood in Brno, the Czech Republic’s second-largest city, coauthored by Faulerová with Kateřina Šedá, won the 2016 Magnesia Litera Award for journalism. Dust Collectors is Faulerová’s debut novel.
SAMPLE
zero
It was the worst moment of her life—except for all the others, that is. It was the worst moment of my life—except for all the others, that is. Except for the ones behind me now, waving to me with that look of satisfaction from a job well done, and except for the ones looking forward to me, shuffling their feet in anticipation, watching out for my arrival, chins lifted and arms spread wide.
But the funny thing is, you can get used to anything. So after some time you start to get bored. You stop trembling in fear, stop nervously chewing your nails and actually offer your face to be slapped, even going so far as to point to where you want the stinging blessing this time, oh yes, please, again, again, smack from one side, smack from the other. And if it doesn’t hurt enough, if it doesn’t catch you off guard, take you by surprise, buckle your knees, kick you in the groin, knock you to the ground, thrash you within an inch of your life and stomp on your throat, you’re even mildly disappointed. That’s all? Really? That’s it? That’s the best you can do? Pff, thumbs down.
But this was the worst moment of my life. Hands down. Across the board. No question. Except for all the others, that is. It goes without saying.
A tired drum set rings out across the empty stage, ba-dum tss. I clear the scene and switch off the last flickering fluorescent light.
one
A young woman walks down a busy street, although in actuality she is older than you imagine. It is one of those autumn days when the passing of summer announces itself. Yes, one could say Indian summer, but it was one of those autumn days when the passing of summer announces itself. The sun was no longer warm enough for you to sit out on a bench in the park, but still warm enough for a walk in nothing but a thin sweater. And it was in a sweater like this that the young woman—seriously, she is older than you imagine—was walking down a busy street. Actually she was wearing a coat. No, a sweater. Hmm. A young woman walked down the street in a light cream coat. It was a pleasant afternoon, as pleasant as you can imagine a pleasant afternoon on one of those autumn days when the passing of summer announces itself.
She was a tall, slender woman, though rather more like gangly and skinny, and her full lips, which you mistakenly imagine as full and sensual instead of full and protruding like a duck’s bill, so that, even despite her gentle smile, it gives the impression of a child’s annoyed arrogance—which for now we will disregard, for the sake of the story, and think on it, agreed—her full lips were gently upturned at the corner into a smile as fresh as one of those autumn days when the passing of summer blah blah blah. Just imagine the genial atmosphere descending over the city as the wind, neither cool nor warm nor sharp nor weak, ruffles her hair, causing her linen coat to dance around her hips, neither curvy nor flowing.
Waiting to cross the street, she stopped at the curb and gazed into the treetops on the other side. Green leaves turning to yellow. Yellow to orange. Orange to brown. Brown to green. This time it could have been an almost enchanted smile, but to imagine this character enchanted is like imagining snow in July, like imagining a grizzly that strokes your hair, like imagining pigeon couples dancing to a samba beat. But it could have been an almost enchanted smile if you squinted with one eye and just closed the other, enchanted as she stepped into the street, because she was thinking about how this step of hers was a step that symbolized hope and determination, a step into a future in which—
And here it comes! It’s happened! A car runs her down so suddenly she doesn’t even have time to stare in terror at the headlights in slow motion. Nor is there time for her whole life to flash before her eyes, and anyway what would it be except a big ball of dust lazily rolling past. But not even that. Just boom bam and kaput. No light at the end of the tunnel, not even a glimmer. Stiff as a board. And the blood spilled out poetically over her cream coat, and not a leaf stirred, and the world didn’t stop and the people didn’t stop and the car that ran her down didn’t stop, and the Earth turned and the day went on and it was still just as nice a day, just as pleasant an afternoon, one of those autumn days when the passing of summer announces itself.
I woke up on the couch with my head wedged in between the backrest and the seat. I freed my head, lifting it with the help of my hand so I could check what time it was. I should make a point of remembering which of my three clocks here (in the display cabinet, on the chest, on the ground) is set to the correct time, since mornings can be slightly disorienting and confusing, and even if you have always woken up exactly, truly unfailingly, at the same time, plus or minus five minutes, assuming you don’t oversleep, or fall asleep at all, for the past few years now, you wonder if it is really as late as you think it is and whether you are where you think you are. I think I am where I’m supposed to be, namely, in my living room, alive and well, hooray, and I think it’s the time it’s supposed to be, namely, somewhere between six fifty-two and fifty-seven, that is, assuming I didn’t oversleep, or fell asleep at all and woke up. Cracking with every step, I relocate my frozen bones to the bathroom, plunge a toothbrush with toothpaste into my mouth, and sit down on the toilet and pee. Next, I step out of my panties, place one foot on the bowl, and open the valve on the water tank. That is my routine, assuming I intend to flush, which sometimes, ew ew, you nasty, nasty girl, I don’t. I tug the flush cord, close the valve on the running toilet, jump down, spit in the sink. Tra-la-la, the radiant smile of an actress in a toothpaste commercial.
And we’re off to puke another day.
And I’ll buy myself a cream coat.
Boom bam and kaput.
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