"And Where Will I Get A Malted?"
Nadir, Moishe
"He was always sleepy. And always ready to sleep. Everywhere. At the biggest mass meetings, at all the concerts, at every important convention, he could be seen asleep. "And he slept in every...
...Isn't that a fine how-do-you-do...
...But to his astonishment he saw that, together with the world, the movies had also disappeared...
...And he slept in every conceivable and inconceivable pose...
...A man should fall asleep with the world under his head and wake up without it...
...There's nothing better in the morning than a glass of malted...
...I deserve the worst...
...And suppose I want a glass of malted, where will I get it...
...It was said that when he was standing under the wedding canopy and reciting the vows 'Thou art to me ...' he fell asleep at the word 'sanctified,' and they had to beat him over the head with brass pestles for several * This story—"The Man Who Slept Through the End of the World," written by the Yiddish writer Moishe Nadir and translated by Irving Howe—is reprintedwith permission from A Treasury of Yiddish Stories, Viking Press...
...He saw, however, that there was no longer any earth on which to sleep...
...With these words our hero wanted to look at his watch but couldn't find it...
...So there isn't any world...
...And who knows if my wife...
...And my wife...
...Eh, he thought, have you ever seen anything like it...
...I love a glass in the morning...
...It isn't my world...
...He wanted to run down the three flights and yell, 'Help!' but there were no stairs on which to run and no air in which to yell...
...Disappeared is disappeared: I might as well go to the movies and kill some time...
...He slept standing up, leaning against himself so that he shouldn't fall down...
...He slept with his elbows in the air and his hands behind his head...
...Arid where will I find a glass of malted...
...What will I do without a world...
...On what will I stretch out if there isn't any world...
...A new watch...
...As our hero stood there in his underwear, wondering what to do, a thought occurred to him: To hell with it...
...Where will I go to work, how will I make a living, especially now that the cost of living is so high and a dozen eggs cost a dollar twenty and who knows if they're even fresh, and besides, what will happen to the five dollars the gas company owes me, And where has my wife gone off to...
...Two dollars...
...Is it possible that she too has disappeared with the world, and with the thirty dollars' pay I had in my pockets...
...And who'll finish the bundle of work in the shop...
...Help, help, hee-lpl Where were my brains...
...And when he wanted merely to go out of doors, he saw that there was no out of doors...
...Only then did he raise two fingers to his forehead and reflect: Apparently I've slept through the end of the world...
...And our hero began to beat his head against the void, but since the void was a very soft one it didn't hurt him and he remained alive to tell this story...
...but in his sleep it seemed to him that he heard thunder in the streets and his bed was shaking somewhat...
...Why didn't I keep an eye on the world and my wife...
...And what will I do if I want to sleep...
...He slept in the theater, in the streets, in the synagogue...
...If I hadn't slept so soundly, he taunted himself, I would have disappeared along with everything else...
...Who knows with whom she's disappeared...
...We mention all this so that you may believe the following story about our hero...
...Once, when he went to sleep, he slept and slept and slept...
...so he thought in his sleep that it was raining outside, and as a result his sleep became still more delicious...
...And she isn't by nature the kind that disappears, he thought to himself...
...And then he slowly said the next word and again fell asleep...
...He searched with both hands in the left and right pockets of the infinite emptiness but could find nothing to touch...
...All right...
...Neighbors used to say that he had already slept through seven big fires, and once, at a really big fire, he was carried out of his bed, still asleep, and put down on the sidewalk...
...I've slept through such a terrible catastrophe...
...Why did I let them disappear when they were still so young...
...In this way he slept for several hours until a patrol wagon came along and took him away...
...He wrapped himself up in his quilt and in his warmth...
...But afterward he bethought himself: I'll go to sleep...
...Wherever he went, his eyes would drip with sleep...
...He became depressed...
...But the watch...
...Evaporated) "For a while he stood there in confusion, unable to comprehend what had happened...
...When he awoke he saw a strange void: his wife was no longer there, his bed was no longer there, his quilt was no longer there...
...Who needs it anyway...
...It wasn't even wound...
...I ;just paid two dollars for a watch and here it's already disappeared, he thought to himself...
...He wanted to look through the window, but there was no window through which to look...
...That I don't care about...
...A pretty mess I've made here, thought our hero and began smoothing his mustache...
...Why should my watch go under...
...Who knows how late it is...
...This way I'm unfortunate, and where will I get a malted...
...hours to wake him up...
...If it's with that presser from the top floor, I'll murder her, so help me God...
...And maybe my back will ache...
...If the world went under, it went under...
...No more world, he thought...
...A pretty mess I've made here, falling asleep...
Vol. 9 • January 1962 • No. 1
