Authors: Amin Maalouf
‘That day, in the sanctuary, the
Samarkand Manuscript
was lost under the boots of the Shah’s soldiers.’
Without breaking his flow, Rochefort stood up, leant against the wall and crossed his arms in his favourite pose.
‘Jamaladin was alive but he was ill and above all shocked that so many visitors, who had been listening to him enthusiastically,
could have stood meekly by while he was publicly humiliated. He drew some curious conclusions from this – the man who had
spent his life denouncing the obscurantism of certain clerics, who had been a regular visitor at the masonic lodges of Egypt,
France and Turkey – he made up his mind to exploit the last weapon he had to make the Shah bend no matter what the consequences.
‘So he wrote a long letter to the chief of the Persian clerics, asking him to use his authority to prevent the monarch from
selling off the property of the Muslims to the infidels. What happened then, you know from the newspapers.’
I remember that the American press indeed reported that the great pontiff of the Shiites had circulated an astounding proclamation:
‘Any person who consumes tobacco places himself thereby in a state of rebellion against the Mahdi, may God speed his arrival.’
Overnight no Persian lit a single cigarette. The pipes, the famous
kalyans
were shelved or smashed and tobacco merchants closed up shop. Amongst the wives of the Shah the ban was strictly observed.
The monarch panicked, and wrote a letter to the religious chief accusing him of irresponsibility ‘since he was not concerned
with the grave consequences which being deprived of tobacco could have on the health of Muslims’. However, the boycott lasted
and was accompanied by stormy demonstrations in Teheran, Tabriz and Isfahan. The concession had to be annulled.
‘Meanwhile,’ Rochefort carried on, ‘Jamaladin had left for England. I met him there and had long talks with him; he seemed
to be distraught and could only say, time and again: “We must bring the Shah down”. He was a wounded and humiliated man who
could think of nothing but avenging himself – all the more so since the monarch, the target of his hatred, had written an
angry letter to Lord Salisbury: “We expelled this man because he was working against the interests of England, and where should
he take refuge? In London.” Officially the Shah was informed that Great Britain was a free country and that no law could be
invoked to suppress a person’s freedom of expression. In private, the Shah was promised that they would seek legal means of
restraining Jamaladin’s activity and he found himself being asked to cut short his stay – which made him decide to leave for
Constantinople, but with death in his heart.’
‘Is that where he is now?’
‘Yes. I am told that he is deeply dejected. The Sultan has allotted him fine quarters where he can receive friends and disciples,
but he is forbidden to leave the country and lives under constant and tight surveillance.’
It was a sumptuous prison with wide-open doors: a palace of wood and marble on the hill of Yildiz, near the residence of the
grand vizir; hot meals were delivered straight from the Sultan’s kitchens; visitors came one after another, crossing through
a metal gate and walking down an alley before leaving their shoes outside the door. The Master’s voice boomed from above with
its grating syllables and closed vowels, he could be heard castigating Persia and the Shah and announcing the evils which
would come to pass.
I tried to make myself unobtrusive, being the foreigner – an American with a small foreign hat, small foreign footsteps and
my foreign concerns who made the trip from Paris to Constantinople, a trip of seventy hours by train across three empires,
in order to ask after a manuscript, an old poetry book, a pathetic bundle of papers in a tumultuous Orient.
A servant came up to me. He made an Ottoman bow, spoke a few words of greeting in French but asked not the slight question.
Everyone came here for the same reason, to meet the Master, to hear the Master or to spy on the Master. I was invited to wait
in the huge sitting room.
As I entered, I notice the silhouette of a woman. This induced me to lower my eyes; I had been told too much about the country’s
customs to walk forward beaming and cheery with my hand outstretched.
I simply mumbled a few words and touched my hat. I had already repaired to the other side of the room from where she was sitting
to settle myself into an English-style armchair. I looked along the carpet and my glance came up against the visitors shoes,
then travelled up her blue and gold dress to her knees, her bust, her neck and her veil. Strangely however, it was not the
barrier of a veil that I came across but that of an unveiled face, of eyes which met mine, and a smile. I looked quickly down
at the ground, over the carpet again, swept over the edge of the tiling and then went over inexorably towards her again, like
a cork coming up to the surface of the water. Over her hair she wore a fine silk kerchief which could be pulled down over
her face should a stranger appear. However, the stranger was there and her veil was still drawn back.
This time she was looking into the distance, offering me her profile to contemplate and her skin of such pure complexion.
If sweetness had a colour, it would be hers. My temples were throbbing with happiness. My cheeks were damp and my hands cold.
God, she was beautiful – my first image of the Orient – a woman such as only the desert poet knew how to praise: her face
was the sun, they would have said, her hair the protecting shadow, her eyes fountains of cool water, her body the most slender
of palm-trees and her smile a mirage.
Could I speak to her? In what way? Could I cup my hands to my mouth so that she would hear me on the other side of the room?
Should I stand up and walk over to her? Sit down in an armchair which was closer to her and risk seeing her smile evaporate
and her veil drop like a blade? Our eyes met again, and then parted as if in jest when the servant came and interrupted us
– which he did a first time to offer me tea and cigarettes. A moment later he bowed to the ground to speak to her in Turkish.
I watched her stand up, veil herself and give him a small leather bag to carry. He went quickly towards the exit and she followed
him.
However, as she reached the door of the sitting room she slowed down leaving the man to distance himself from her. Then she
turned towards me and stated, in a loud voice and in a French purer than mine:
‘You never know, our paths might meet!’
Whether it was said in politeness or as a promise, her words were accompanied by a mischievous smile which I saw as much as
defiance as sweet reproach. Then, as I was getting up out of my seat with the utmost awkwardness, and while I was stumbling
about trying to regain both my balance and my composure, she remained immobile, her look enveloping me with amused benevolence.
I could not manage to utter a single word. She disappeared.
I was still standing by the window, trying to make out amongst the trees the coach carrying her off when a voice brought me
back to reality.
‘Forgive me for having kept you waiting.’
It was Jamaladin. His left hand held an extinguished cigar; he held out his right hand and shook mine with warmth and friendship.
‘My name is Benjamin Lesage. I have come on the recommendation of Henri Rochefort.’
I handed him my letter of introduction, but he slipped it into his pocket without looking at it. He opened his arms, gave
me a hug and a kiss on the forehead.
‘Rochefort’s friends are my friends. I speak to them with an open heart.’
Putting his arm around my shoulder, he escorted me towards a wooden staircase which led upstairs.
‘I hope that my friend Henri is keeping well. I heard that his return from exile was a real triumph. With all those Parisians
lining the streets and shouting his name, he must have felt great happiness! I read the account in
l’Intransigeant
. He sends it to me regularly although it reaches me late. Reading it brings back to my ears the sounds of Paris.’
Jamaladin spoke laboured but correct French. Sometimes I prompted the word he seemed to be looking for. When I was right,
he thanked me and if not, he continued to rack his brains, contorting his lips and chin slightly. He carried on:
‘I lived in Paris in a room which was dark but which opened up on to a vast world. It was a hundred times smaller than this
house but I was less cramped there. I was thousands of kilometres from my people but I worked for their advancement more efficiently
than I can do here or in Persia. My voice was heard from Algiers to
Kabul. Today only those who honour me with their visits can hear me. Of course they are always welcome, particularly if they
come from Paris.’
‘I do not actually live in Paris. My mother is French and my name sounds French, but I am an American. I live in Maryland.’
This seemed to amuse him.
‘When I was expelled from India in 1882 I stopped off in the United States. Can you imagine that I even envisaged asking for
American citizenship. You are smiling! Many of my fellow Muslims would be scandalised. The Sayyid Jamaladin, apostle of the
Islamic renaissance, descendant of the Prophet, taking the citizenship of a Christian country? However, I was not ashamed
of it and moreover I have told this story to my friend Wilfrid Blunt and authorized him to quote it in his memoirs. My justification
is quite simple: there is no single corner of the whole of the Muslim world where I can live free from tyranny. In Persia
I tried to take refuge in a sanctuary which traditionally benefits from full immunity, but the monarch’s soldiers came in
and dragged me away from the hundreds of visitors who were listening to me, and with one unfortunate exception, almost no
one moved or dared to protest. There is no religious site, university or shed where one can be protected from the reign of
the arbitrary!‘
He feverishly stroked a painted wooden globe which rested on a low table before adding:
‘It is worse in Turkey. Am I not an official guest of Abdul-Hamid, the Sultan and Caliph? Did he not send me letter after
letter, reproaching me, as the Shah did, for spending my life amongst infidels? I should have just replied: if you had not
transformed our beautiful countries into prisons, we would have no need to find refuge with the Europeans! But I weakened
and let myself be tricked. I came to Constantinople and you can see the result. In spite of the rules of hospitality, that
half-mad man holds me prisoner. Lately I sent a message to him, saying “If I am your guest, give me permission to depart!
If I am your prisoner, put shackles on my feet and throw me into a dungeon!” However, he did not deign to respond. If I had
the citizenship of the United States, France or Austria-Hungary, never-mind that of Russia or England,
my consul would have marched straight into the grand vizir’s office without knocking and he would have obtained my freedom
within a half-hour. I tell you, we, the Muslims of this century, are orphans.’
He was breathless but made an effort to add:
‘You may write up everything that I have just said except that I called Sultan Abdul-Hamid half-mad. I do not wish to lose
every last chance of flying out of this cage one day. Besides, it would be a lie since that man is almost completely mad,
a dangerous criminal, pathologically suspicious and completely under the sway of his Aleppine astronomer.’
‘Have no fear, I shall write nothing of all this.’
I took advantage of his request to clear up a misunderstanding.
‘I must tell you that I am not a journalist. Monsieur Rochefort, who is my grandfather’s cousin, recommended that I come and
see you, but the aim of my visit is not to write an article about Persia nor about yourself.’
I revealed to him my interest in the Khayyam manuscript and my intense desire to be able to leaf through it one day and to
study its contents closely. He listened to me with unflagging attention and evident joy.
‘I am obliged to you for snatching me away from my woes for some moments. The subject that you mention has always gripped
me. Have you read in Monsieur Nicholas’ introduction to the
Rubaiyaat
, the story of the three friends, Nizam al-Mulk, Hassan Sabbah and Omar Khayyam? They were radically different men, each of
whom represented an eternal aspect of the Persian soul. Sometimes I have the impression that I am all three of them at the
same time. Like Nizam al-Mulk I dream of establishing a great Muslim state, even if it were led by an unbearable Turkish sultan.
Like Hassan Sabbah, I sow subversion over all the lands of Islam, I have disciples who would follow me to the death …’
He broke off, worried, then pulled himself together, smiled and carried on:
‘Like Khayyam, I am on the look-out for the rare joys of the present moment and I compose verses about wine, the cupbearer,
the tavern and the beloved; like him, I mistrust false zealots. When, in certain quatrains, Omar speaks about himself, I sometimes
believe that he is depicting me: “On our gaudy Earth there walks a man, neither rich nor poor, neither believer nor infidel,
he courts no truth, venerates no law … On our gaudy Earth, who is this brave and sad man?”’
Having said that, he relit his cigar and became pensive. A small piece of glowing ash landed on his beard. He brushed if off
with a practised gesture, and started speaking again:
‘Since my childhood I have had an immense admiration for Khayyam the poet, but above all the philosopher, the free-thinker.
I am amazed that it took him so long to conquer Europe and America. You can imagine how happy I was to have in my possession
the original book of the
Rubaiyaat
written in Khayyam’s own hand.’
‘When did you have it?’
‘It was offered to me fourteen years ago in India by a young Persian who had made the trip with the sole aim of meeting me.
He introduced himself to me with the following words: “Mirza Reza, a native of Kirman, formerly a merchant in the Teheran
Bazaar. Your obedient servant.” I smiled and asked him what he meant by saying “formerly a merchant”, and that is what led
him to tell me his story. He had just opened a used clothing business when one of the Shah’s sons came to buy some merchandise,
shawls and furs, to the value of eleven hundred toumans – about one thousand dollars. However, when Mirza Reza presented himself
the next day to the Prince’s to be paid, he was insulted, beaten and even threatened with death if he took it into his head
to collect what he was owed. It was then that he decided to come and see me. I was teaching in Calcutta. “I have just understood,”
he told me, “that in a country run in an arbitrary fashion one cannot earn an honest living. Was it not you who wrote that
Persia needs a Constitution and a Parliament? Consider me, from this day on, your most devoted disciple. I have shut my business
and left my wife in order to follow you. Order and I shall obey!”’