Translated from the Serbian by

Randall A. Major
 Table of Contents

Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

THE PROFESSIONAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
THE MARATHONERS RUN A VICTORY LAP . . 61
THE BALKAN SPY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
SPRINGTIME IN JANUARY . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
DRESS REHEARSAL FOR A SUICIDE . . . . . . 275
LOVE IN THE TIME OF HYPNOSIS . . . . . . . 359

Randall A. Major: Afterword . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418

 FOREWORD

Dušan Kovačević (1948) is Serbia’s best-known playwright and

screenwriter. One of his plays, The Professional, which has been
running in Belgrade since 1989, was staged by Circle Reper-
tory Compa­ny in New York in 1995, and his film Underground
won the Palme d’Or at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival. As then
“The New York Times” correspondent Chris Hedges noticed,
Dušan’s movies and plays have achieved cult status within the
former Yugoslavia. Also, the often cynical new genera­tion,
which has paid in blood for the nationalist dreams of its lead-
ers, re­cites lines from his work like man­tras. “Don’t let them
kill you until we’ve won,” taken from the play Radovan III, is,
like dozens of other lines, part of the vocabulary in Serbia.*
Showing of The Professional, his 12th play, in the United
States and London in 1995 turned considerable attention to-
ward Dušan Kovačević in the U.S. The Sundance Institute invit-
ed Mr. Kovačević as a guest to a seminar for screenplay writers.
In an article for “Sundance Screenwriters Lab” in January 1995,
Robert Redford hailed The Professional as a story which can be
* Chris Hedges, Scathing ’Conscience’ of Balkans Spares No One, “The
New York Times International”, February 8, 1996.
8 Dušan Kovačević

the heart of any medium: “Even though the piece is politically

oriented, it has a solid, wonderful story. The story of two peo-
ple, two wills, two souls which carry within themselves tragedy,
humor, hopelessness and humanness is a universal theme”.
In The Professional, Kovačević strikes a familiar theme. The
two main characters differ in age, ideology, ethnicity and social
circumstances. Teja was a dissident who is now flourishing
following the col­lapse of communism. Luka, a former secret
service agent who spied on Teja, has had to deal with the de-
struction of a world that gave him meaning. He now drives a
cab. The two are brought together by their past rela­tionship,
although they have now changed roles. The oppressed has be­
come the oppressor, and the new power structure is as corrupt
and immoral as the old. And like Louis-Ferdinand Celine and
Edward Albee, Mr. Kovačević insists on plunging into the
depths of human despair and depravity with his dark humor.
It is humor, he says, that best points out the incongruity of a
people living in economic and political decline but clutching
at fantastic myths of past glory and achievement.
Marathoners Run a Victory Lap is a farce about five gen-
erations of a family of undertakers – with characters between
25 and 125 years old – in which a rebellion and conflict over
dominance erupt after the death of their oldest member. By
reselling coffins that a rival company digs out from the local
graveyard, the Topalović family comes into conflict with the
world of the living. A timeless look at human greed and folly
at a time of constant turmoil in the Balkans.
The Balkan Spy is a story about a self-proclaimed protector
of state security, a paranoid spy-like citizen who sees in his in-
nocent tenant a threat and danger to society. With the help of
his equally uncompromising brother, he makes unbearable not
only the life of the tenant but also the lives of his own family
members by trying to ruin the tenant’s plans, which exist only
in this Balkan spy’s head.
 Foreword 9

Springtime in January is a piece that served as a screenplay

for the film Underground. Aided by a war profiteer and ad-
venturer, a group of people produce arms and ammunition
for resistance to Nazi authorities in the secret underground of
a family house during WW2. The business lasts for 15 years
after the end of the war and the profiteer, using all kinds of
disinformation, makes the people living underground believe
that the war is still going. When the heavily armed leader of
the underground group finds a secret exit to the outer world,
he starts shooting and killing the actors and the film crew that
are making a film about WW2.
In Dress Rehearsal for a Suicide, where life and theatre over-
lap, three eccentric businessmen try to prevent a disillusioned
actor and desperate debtor from committing suicide by jump-
ing off a bridge. If that were to happen, their illegal business
activities, including sailing the river, marina construction and
fishing, would be uncovered. In the end, it is unveiled that the
actor’s intention to commit suicide was just a dress rehearsal
for a suicide in a theatre play.
Love in the Time of Hypnosis is a fantasy about limits and
alienation in the contemporary world. A family is living in
the mountain wilderness, far from urban society, and while
the parents don’t want to abandon the illusions of their own
reality and dreams, their daughter wants to leave them and go
into the unknown. Young people are leaving their hearths, but
natural beauty and human warmth remain intact somewhere
in an authentic world that is slowly disappearing.
In an interview, Mr. Kovačević stated: “We suffer from
primitive capitalism and this means we also suffer from primi-
tive art. It all re­minds me of Woody Allen’s Bullets Over Bro-
adway, where petty mob­sters have been handed control of
everything from our factories to our cultural life. The war that
never ends is the war between the parent and the child, the fa-
ther and the son. The only solution is love and compassion. In
10 Dušan Kovačević

our families we have fought too often over ideologies. Pri­vate

wars have led to real wars. This is our fate.”

Dušan Kovačević graduated from the Academy for Theatre,

Film and Television in the Serbian capital Belgrade, worked as
an assistant professor at the Academy and as a dramaturge for
TV Belgrade’s drama program. He served as Serbian ambas-
sador to Portugal in 2005 and 2006.
Kovačević is the author of 21 plays (the 6 most popular
and awarded plays were translated in this book into English),
10 screenplays, two novels and two books of short stories. He
is the author of several radio dramas and TV series, and has
also directed many theatre plays and films based on his own
written works.
He has received many domestic and international awards,
including the Grand Prix for best screenplay at the Interna-
tional Film Festival in Montreal, Canada twice (for the movies
The Balkan Spy and The Professional), awards for best film and
best screenplay at the International film festival in Viareggio,
Italy, the FIPRESCI award by the international jury of film
critics for The Professional, the Chaplin Award in Vevey, Swit-
zerland for the film Who’s Singin’ Over There? and many other
awards at film festivals in Valencia, Vienna, Marseille, etc. The
film website IMDb has put the film Underground in 223rd place
among the best 300 movies of all time.
His plays have been translated into 27 languages and staged
in the U.S., Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand, Greece, Cy-
prus, Germany, Austria, France, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Por-
tugal, Mexico, Argentina, Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic,
Slovakia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Turkey, Albania, Iran, Israel, Japan
and countries of former Yugoslavia (Slovenia, Croatia, North
Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina).
 Foreword 11

“The main theme of all of my work is the insecurity of the

individual before the system,” Kovačević says. “It does not
matter what the system is called, what ideology it embraces,
the distortion done to the individual, the violence carried out
by the system against the individual, is always the same and
so is the result.”
He is a permanent member of the Serbian Academy of
Sciences and Arts, and has been the manager of the “Zvezdara
Theatre” in Belgrade since 1998.

Dejan Mihailović
THE PROFESSIONAL
A woeful comedy, according to Luka
 CHARACTERS:

I – Teodor “Teja” Kraj

LUKA LABAN – the Professional
MARTA – Teodor’s secretary
And one, quite sane, LUNATIC
My name is Teodor Kraj. My mother called me ‘Teja’. My friends
did also…while I still had some. My name, most likely, tells you
nothing. I am a writer… At least I hope I am… I’m forty-five
years-old. So far I’ve published two books.
A book of poetry and a book of short stories. That’s slightly
depressing! And I look like I’ve written twenty novels. Magni-
ficently bad.
WHERE ARE MY UNWRITTEN BOOKS?
The following story is unbelievable, but it’s true. And it’s an
answer to that unsettling question.
I’m writing this manuscript all at one time, right on the
typewriter, just as everything played itself out. The encounter
with that man changed my entire former life. Is it possible for
someone to change your entire former life? It is! How could that
be? Easy, if you’re as fortunate and smart as I am.
I was sitting in my office and leafing through some submitted
manuscripts. Poetry collections, short story collections, collec-
tions of novels, collections of travelogues, collections of memo-
ires… Most of that scribbling had also been offered to other
publishing houses. I knew all of the content by heart because
16 Dušan Kovačević

the drunken writers told it to me in various taverns. Since the

day I became the Editor-in-Chief, I have never managed to eat
supper without also “consuming” a fresh, ingenious work… And
the telephone just kept ringing. I didn’t want to pick up, because
I knew that one of the graphomaniacs was calling. I thought, at
least today, on this very day, I don’t have to get upset. However,
the telephone rang incessantly. And it would have rung all day
had I not answered it.

I: Hello? Yes… Yes…

(I was, of course, right. A writer whom I deeply despise and
whose very name nauseated me was calling me. About his
books, I thought, spoke, and wrote only the worst things…
But now, at this job, I was no longer my private “I”, here I
was now Someone whom Somebody appointed instead of
Someone Else to worry about and take care of Something.
And despite my indescribable revulsion, I tried to keep the
conversation cool. However…)
I: Yes… Yes, that’s me… Well, how can you possibly be asking
me this again? Your book was rejected before I took over
this job. I’ve been here, as you know, for not quite two
months, and your book was rejected, as you also know, six
months ago… I beg your pardon? Why am I using the word
“rejected”? You find it offensive… Oh, okay, your book is
not in our publishing plan or schedule during the next year.
Does that sound better? I’m impertinent? I’m impertinent?
And think about it, how could I have read a book which was
returned to you six months ago? It wasn’t returned? Well,
who did you give it to? All right, go ahead and ask him for
it… He said I have it? He is lying. Tell him he’s lying…
(And as I listened to the hysterical, pre-cardiac-arrest voice,
preparing myself to answer in like manner and slam down
the receiver so that his encrusted eardrum would burst, an
 The Professional 17

overly loud song was heard from the office next door. The
former editor, replaced because of his catastrophic business
practices, had warned me and the whole publishing house
that he was alive and that he would, sooner or later, take
his revenge on us. I went over to the wall and slammed my
fist into it. The song grew a little quieter, but the madman
continued screaming from the telephone receiver. To make
things worse, enter my secretary Marta. She came into the
office and spoke to me conspiratorially, looking back at the
door as if being pursued by someone.)
MARTA: There’s a man looking for you.
(I nodded and indicated that he should wait, and then, cho-
king down a curse, I finished the telephone quarrel.)
I: Please talk to the person you gave the manuscript to, to
whoever read it, and whoever rejected it!
(I intentionally emphasized the word “rejected” and slammed
down the phone. Marta observed me with a pitying, lovely,
and affectionate countenance. I was sorry because she felt
sorry. She waited for me to calm down a bit and to wipe the
sweat from my brow.)
MARTA: Do you know how high your blood pressure is?
I: I know, Marta… but how am I supposed to talk to a man
who is… incorrigible, rude, crude, and primitive! And, and,
how am I to explain things to this idiot who terrorizes us
with his music…
MARTA: Please try to calm down.
(She came over to me, put her hand on my shoulder, looked
at me, and smiled.)
MARTA: You promised me that, today, you would not allow
yourself to get irritated… At least not today.
I: Yeah… How is your daughter?
18 Dušan Kovačević

MARTA: Well, so-so…

I: She’ll be all right, you’ll see… Shall we go to lunch? Reserve
us a place in a nice restaurant. Wherever your heart desires.
MARTA: I don’t know… I don’t feel much like going to lunch.
I: You promised me.
MARTA: Yes… What do I tell this guy?
I: Who?
MARTA: Well, I told you, there’s a man looking for you.
I: What man?
MARTA: I don’t know who he is. I’ve never seen him before.
He looks a bit odd. I don’t think he’s a writer.
I: Oh, he’s a writer. He’s surely a writer, Marta. Nowadays ev-
eryone is a writer, and no one looks like a writer anymore.
The less he looks like a writer, the more books he’s written…
MARTA: Don’t get upset.
I: Yes… Please, tell him I’m not here.
MARTA: I already did, but he said he knew that you’re not
here, but you should see him anyway.
(I thought I didn’t hear her well.)
I: He told you what?
MARTA: That you should see him regardless of the fact that
you’re not here… He said he’s not here on his own personal
business.
I: Then who is he here for?
MARTA: I don’t know… He’s carrying a satchel and a rather
large black suitcase.
I: A satchel and a large black suitcase?
MARTA: Yes.
I: Till now they always brought manuscripts in file folders.
MARTA: He looks like someone who just came in on a train…
Maybe he’s a relative of yours.
(I looked at her and immediately grew angry, because she
obviously wasn’t aware of what she’d said.)
 The Professional 19

I: A relative of mine?
MARTA: Yes…
I: He looks a bit odd, is carrying a satchel and a rather large
black suitcase? That, according to you, could be a relative
of mine?
MARTA: You didn’t understand what I was saying…
I: I understood you, Marta, I got it. You were just saying what
everyone thinks. A guy can live in this city for a hundred
years and there’s still always someone around who will talk
about where he really came from. Whatever good you did
here, everything bad—you brought it with you from…
MARTA: I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to say that.
I: People hide their thoughts in words. I don’t know who said
that, but I’ve felt it on my own shoulders! Why would some
sort of madman be my cousin?
MARTA: Well, he asked me, “Is Teja here?” And you told me
that’s what your mother called you.
I: He asked you if Teja was here?
MARTA: Yes.
I: Someone told him that is what my mother used to call me…
Let him in and, please, call me out for some sort of emer-
gency meeting… And, please don’t be angry. This crazy
fellow is pissing me off.
(I kissed her hand, she smiled, pirouetted like a ballerina, and
slipped out with an elegant stride. I raised my arms above
my head to stretch out my back and my soul… And then an
elderly man came in, in relatively good shape, wearing a long
brown raincoat, with carefully combed hair, clean-shaven,
carrying a satchel in one hand, and a rather large black
suitcase in the other. He stopped, looked at me and gave me
a friendly smile.)
MAN: Hello.
I: Hello.
20 Dušan Kovačević

(He looked at me like a childhood friend or a close relative

who hadn’t seen me for a while. Marta was right. He did
look like a relative who had just come in on a train. I stood
there, trying to remember who he was… I have at least two
thousand relatives. I hadn’t seen most of them for twenty
years and more. And all of them are taking note of things,
writing, scribbling things down.)
I: Can I help you?
(The man watched me in silence, and then shrugged as if he
were sorry that I had greeted him like that. I tried to return
his smile, however, it was too late. He grew despondent and
asked me quietly.)
MAN: You don’t know who I am?
I: No …
(His smile fell onto the green office carpet. And I felt sorry for
him, I don’t know why.)
MAN: You don’t know?
I: I don’t know… I’m really sorry, but…
MAN: Can I put my suitcase down?
I: Of course, no need to ask. Would you like to sit down?
MAN: No.
(He put down the rather large and obviously rather heavy suit-
case, and then he looked me straight in the eye. Instantly, I rea-
lized that he wasn’t a childhood friend, or a forgotten relative.)
MAN: I was sure you would “know” me, at least after the last
two years… At least that much… However, now I can see…
I: Aren’t you perhaps…
MAN: An old army buddy?
(He gave a laugh, and suddenly became more formal.)
MAN: Do you remember that story of yours: Old Army Buddy?
I: My story, Old Army Buddy?
 The Professional 21

MAN: Yes. About the fellow who came up to you in the street,
hugged you, kissed you on the cheek, and asked, “Do you
see our pals?” And you stood there, just like now, and asked
yourself: What pals? The man grew despondent, like I just
did, and said: “You know, our pals from the army.” And
you were relieved, you were happy, because at least you
had something to go on. To make the poor guy happy, you
said with certainty and alacrity: Our army pals? “I do see
them, of course I see them! How could I not?” And the guy
believed you, hugged you, patted you on the shoulder—he
was happy you hadn’t forgotten it all, and he asked you:
“And who do you see most often?” And… and then you,
just like now, stood there and tried to remember at least
one name. And you remembered Corporal Marko Kostić.
And, greatly relieved, you said: “I often see Corporal Marko
Kostić.” And the fellow just looked at you, dropped his gaze
and whispered: “I am Corporal Marko Kostić.”
(And then he smiled again. I smiled too, although I didn’t
much feel like it.)
I: Nice story, but, unfortunately, it’s not mine.
MAN: Yes, it is yours. So, if you please, don’t ask me if we are
old army buddies… We’re not.
I: I’m sorry, what was your name again?
MAN: My name is Luka Laban… Luka Laban… My name,
most likely, tells you nothing?
(I had never heard of him. The man gave me a steely, calm
stare. I started losing my temper, which isn’t difficult for me.)
I: Comrade Luka, perhaps you’ve made some sort of mistake?
In this building there are several people named Teodor…
LUKA: I know. But there’s only one Teodor “Teja” Kraj…
I won’t keep you long. I know you’re going out to lunch
with Marta…
I: How do you know that?
22 Dušan Kovačević

LUKA: Well, isn’t today your forty-fifth birthday?

I: It is.
(I looked at him in amazement. But then he went over to the
desk, put down his leather satchel and, one after another,
took out four bound books with prominent titles, like those
usually done by street-side bookbinders. The covers were four
different colors: black, blue, green, and white. He stacked
them one atop the other, and then placed his hand on them,
like a man showing off valuable goods or finishing off a price
negotiation… I was relieved. A lot of things had crossed my
mind. But it turned out, after all, that he was an everyday
graphomaniac who had just made his arrival mysterious. I
relaxed, guffawed, and returned to my chair. I leaned back
and asked routinely, like a doctor who knows what a case is
really all about.)
I: Comrade Luka, those books are manuscripts, prepared for
printing?
LUKA: Yes.
I: And you had them bound by a local bookbinder?
LUKA: No, my son Miloš bound them, and I just used a stencil
to write out the titles. I didn’t dare give them to a bookbinder.
I: Because it happens that they often lose or destroy a manu-
script?
LUKA: Yes, but not just because of that…
I: And they’re known, so I’ve heard, to report it to the police if
there’s something… awkward, problematic.
LUKA: They do, they do.
(I was ever more certain and relaxed. A classic case of a
paranoid graphomaniac.)
I: Instead of the police working for the people, the people are
working for the police… Do you mind if I have a look?
LUKA: Of course not. That’s why I brought them here.
 The Professional 23

(I picked up the manuscript bound in blue and read the title

out loud.)
I: Orations about… What are the orations about?
LUKA: About everything.
I: Aha… All four books are Orations about…?
LUKA: No. The green book is a collection of short stories: Sto-
ries from a Lost Homeland. The third is a collection of urban
stories, and so its title is: Short, Urban Stories. Something
like Chekhov’s anecdote-stories…
(I looked at him. He was laying out the books calmly and
reasonably, not the usual practice of such “writers”. He picked
up the fourth book, and instead of an explanation, he read
the title aloud:)
LUKA: Encounters and Conversations.
I: Nice, Comrade Luka…
LUKA: And in the satchel, there’s also a play. For the theater.
I: A theater play?
LUKA: Yes. Yes, a one-act play. The working title is: A Woeful
Comedy.
I: A Woeful Comedy?
LUKA: Yes. It may not be the best title, but it is surely the most
truthful. And insofar as I understood Aristotle, in his art a
writer dare not make mistakes in terms of the truth.
I: You’ve read Aristotle?
(He and Aristotle? I looked at him as if he were a specter. He,
this guy, had read Aristotle. I repeated the question because
he hadn’t answered.)
I: You’ve read Aristotle?
LUKA: Read a bit, listened a lot more.
I: You listened?
LUKA: Yes… the truth is the truth.
I: You listened to Aristotle?
24 Dušan Kovačević

(Luka looked at me and said quietly,)

LUKA: If you please, you don’t have to insult me.
I: Beg your pardon, but…
LUKA: It was more that I listened to things about Aristotle. In
Orations, there’s a lecture about Aristotle.
I: Don’t get angry, Comrade Luka, but I have a question to ask.
You’re not a writer by profession?
LUKA: No.
I: You don’t make your living by writing?
LUKA: No.
I: And you did all of this along with your daytime job?
LUKA: Yes.
I: Two books of stories, a book of Orations, a book called En-
counters and Conversations, a theater play…
LUKA: And I have several hundred pages at home that still
need to be rearranged and worked into a book.
I: My congratulations, Comrade Luka. Until two months ago,
I was just a writer, and do you know how much I’ve written
so far? Two books. Just two books. And you, while doing
your regular job, have brought me your collected works.
LUKA: I really worked hard. I always tried to be a professional.
I: That’s obvious, Comrade Luka. Really obvious… And there
are more manuscripts in the suitcase?
LUKA: No. There is a variety of things in the suitcase.
I: A variety of things? What kind of things?
LUKA: Umbrellas, gloves, lighters, glasses, caps…
I: Caps?
LUKA: Yes.
I: Are there a lot of them?
LUKA: Well, yes, I guess a dozen or so… I mean, eleven.
I: You like caps?
LUKA: No. I never wore caps… These caps, I collected.
I: You collected caps?
 The Professional 25

LUKA: Yes. Caps… and a lot of other stuff.

(Where is Marta now to get me out of here for that meeting?
I began to grow angry with myself. This man was not to be
blamed, he is what he is, but my passion for picking the brains
of people beyond space and time bordered on mental illness.
I looked at the clock, clapped my hands like someone brin-
ging a matter to an end, and spoke the sentence with which
I usually end such conversations. If only I had paid attention
to intelligent folks earlier, as much as to the halfwits and
lunatics, I might have done something smarter!)
I: Comrade Luka, I’m really happy to have met you. I will
read all of this carefully, and you drop by in ten days or so.
Somewhere, here at the end of the month…
LUKA: I’m sorry, I can’t.
I: Why can’t you? You’re from out of town?
LUKA: I am indeed, but I’m about to undergo surgery.
I: You’re having surgery done?
LUKA: Yes.
I: Is it serious?
LUKA: It’s not—if I survive.
I: Well…what should I do with these books of yours?
LUKA: With my books? Those are not my books.
I: They’re not yours?
LUKA: No.
I: Then whose are they?
LUKA: Yours.
I: Whose?
LUKA: Yours, sir. Yours, my friend.
I: Mine?
LUKA: Yes.
I: Mine?
LUKA: Yes, those are your books.
I: What do you mean mine, Comrade Luka? What are you
trying to say?
26 Dušan Kovačević

(I laughed feebly.)
LUKA: Please don’t laugh, sir…
I: How can I not laugh? I had just started thinking you were
serious, and then you give me “my” books. Whose books
are these?
LUKA: Yours, sir… I am Luka Laban, a retired police agent.
I: Police agent?
LUKA: Yes… For many years, you were my official case. I was
assigned to your life and work. These are your Orations,
your stories, and your Encounters and Conversations. All
of this is yours.
I: Mine?
LUKA: Yes.
I: All of this is mine? And how could all of this be mine?
LUKA: Easily. I just recorded everything and copied it down
from the tapes.
(I stood there holding onto the back of the chair. My gaze
moved back and forth from the man in the raincoat to “my”
books on the desk. He was watching me calmly, in a conge-
nial way.)
LUKA: We’ve known each other for eighteen years. Or rather,
I have known you for eighteen years. In my official capacity
for sixteen years, and two more years privately, because of
my son.
I: Because of your son?
LUKA: Yes, because of my son Miloš. When they forced me to
retire, two years ago, he asked me to go on looking after you.
I: To go on looking after me?
LUKA: Yes.
I: To keep following me?
LUKA: Yes… And to gather up everything you did.
I: So your son also works for the police?
LUKA: My son is a teacher of literature. Actually, he taught
 The Professional 27

literature, up until they fired him… Because of you.

I: Because of me?
LUKA: Yes, because of you.
(Marta came into the office. She looked at the stranger du-
biously. She announced what we had agreed.)
MARTA: I’m sorry, they’re demanding your presence at an
emergency session of the Publishing Council.
I: Tell them, please, that I’ll be a little late…
MARTA: You’re not feeling well?
I: Could you be so kind as to have two cups of coffee brought in.
MARTA: You’re not feeling well? What’s wrong?
I: I’m all right…
MARTA: No you’re not. You’re awfully pale…
(From the office next door, like a wave, a tide of choral song
crashed in.)
I: Please, Marta, go tell that idiot to quiet down a little, because
if I have to go in there…
MARTA: He’s an incredible low-life. I told him, and he said
they were getting together to celebrate your birthday. They
brought in food and drink from the hotel.
I: To celebrate my birthday?
MARTA: All of those people you reassigned to the printing
house are in there. I argued with them… They insulted me…
(She listlessly shrugged and went out… Luka was standing by
the window, observing the hotel across the street.)
LUKA: That woman respects you… and loves you. You know
what happened to her husband?
I: I do.
LUKA: He died from leukemia?
I: Yes.
LUKA: No, he didn’t.
28 Dušan Kovačević

I: He didn’t?
LUKA: No, he didn’t.
I: Well, she told me that he… So, what did he die of?
LUKA: Of himself.
I: Of himself?
LUKA: Yes. He hanged himself in the hospital… He got sick
of himself, and he cured himself.
I: I didn’t know.
LUKA: Since then, her daughter has fallen seriously ill… Poor
woman.
(He turned around and looked at me, somehow strangely,
as if warning me.)
I: I didn’t know.
LUKA: That’s why I told you… May I sit down? My back is
killing me.
I: Yes, please…
(I waved to a spot on the leather sofa, but he refused it, ju-
stifying himself with a smile.)
LUKA: I can’t sit on soft things. When I still could, I didn’t
have anywhere to sit. Now when I can—I don’t dare. May
I sit in your chair?
I: Yes, of course.
(He went around the desk, pulled up the hem of his raincoat
and sat in my chair, and I returned in front of the desk.
Momentarily I found myself in the place where I belonged.)
I: Comrade Luka, why was your son fired, because of me?
LUKA: Not because of you.
I: But you just said…
LUKA: Because of your books. More precisely, because of two
of your books that he introduced into the curriculum.
I: And which of my books are so “problematic”?
 The Professional 29

LUKA: These here…

(And he picked up the manuscripts bound in blue and white.)
LUKA: Orations about…and Encounters and Conversations.
I: He was fired because of them?
LUKA: Yes.
I: Orations about… What are those Orations about, Comrade
Luka? What are my books about, please tell me?
LUKA: Well, here… Have a look…
(I circled the desk and leaned over the bound manuscript. He
carefully turned the pages and explained things to me like a
teacher explaining things to a remedial student.)
LUKA: Miloš gave them all titles. I’m not versed in literature,
a lot of it is unclear to me, but there are stories I like, there
are sentences I’ve memorized, here and there is a truth that
is close to my heart. So, Orations about… is a collection of
your speeches in various places at various times, and about
various matters. Mostly, all of those Orations are about
communists and communism… I apologize for speaking
so plainly, Miloš can talk like you speak and write, he’s a
teacher and I just work for the police.
I: Just go on talking the way you feel comfortable.
LUKA: Can I do it the way it’s most truthful to me? Your first
speech was also my first encounter with you. Eighteen years
ago, at the Faculty of Philosophy, in the courtyard beneath
the lindens, you gave a speech about freedom. I was there
among the students. On assignment. That was when we
started tracking you as a young and exceptionally danger-
ous man. I clandestinely recorded the speech, retyped it in
my office, turned in two copies, and took one copy home. I
wanted to read it slowly, to get to know you better, because
I was told that you would be my assignment for quite some
time. I perused it at home and concluded that you should
30 Dušan Kovačević

be killed. Simple job, the first time you get drunk, run over
you with a car like a dog. Like the worst kind of stray.
I: Run over me like a stray?
LUKA: The next day, I proposed that very thing to my boss,
but he said: Let’s not dirty up the streets, Luka.
(I looked at him like a monster, and he went on sitting there
calmly.)
I: You wanted to run over me? To kill me?
LUKA: Yes.
I: Are you joking, Comrade Luka?
LUKA: No. Had he told me then, “Run over him!” —you’d be
dead. Not the first time or the last… There have been so
many accidents.
I: But why, good Lord?
LUKA: What do you mean “why”? Why, at that time I was a
communist down to the marrow in my bones, and in On
Liberty you began with the words: “Nature needed a million
years to make man out of a chimp, and communism needed
just half a century to return man among the animals…”
I: I said that?
LUKA: You shouted it. Here, have a look. It’s all here, word
for word… I kept that speech at my house, in my folder,
not knowing that the very same day I was opening a literary
dossier in addition to the one at the police.
I: A literary dossier?
LUKA: That’s how my son Miloš defines it. He re-christened
your speeches as Orations, because he thought the titles
should be literary, and not in law-enforcement style.
I: But they were in law-enforcement style?
LUKA: My title, for the whole book, was: Public Appearances.
(The telephone rang again. I didn’t pick up. Luka took out
a rather large handkerchief and wiped his sweaty brow. I
watched him, hoping that all of this was just a very bad joke.)