Amidst calamity, whether that be war, famine, environmental disasters, or anything that disrupts individuals’ existence, life moves forward, history moves forward. This constant progression of time has become a recurring theme so far in my “The Reverberations of World War II” course, specifically in Anna Seghers’ Transit and Victor Serge’s Last Times. Each of these novels focuses on individuals fleeing the advancing Nazis. They move from Paris to the unoccupied zone in Marseille, looking for passage out of danger.

During the migration south, refugees die and refugees enter the world. The cycle continues, even amidst destruction. Detailing his journey to Paris before his migration south to Marseille, the narrator of Transit says, “And even as I was fleeing to Paris I realized these were merely the remnants of those wretched human masses as so many had died on the road or on the trains. But I hadn’t counted on that fact that so many would also be born on the way.” While the narrator expected tragedy and death as people escaped the Nazis, he didn’t fathom that life would enter such a world, that it would spring forth from such violence.

The narrator envisions the end of the world, the Last Judgement, approaching, and he even describes Marseille as the edge of the world, the place of departure and escape. Yet, he also remains cognizant of the fact that the impending destruction has occurred again and again and again. People, throughout the ages, have encountered tyranny and the march of war, causing them to flee to lands unknown in hopes of escaping the the mechanical machinery of death. Sitting in the pizzeria he haunts throughout the novel, the narrator sits facing the open fire of the pizza oven instead of the window, as he usually does because he likes “watching the open fire . . . and the way the man hits the dough with his bent wrists.”

The fire and the man’s manipulation of the dough reminds the narrator that people have been doing this same things for ages, long before he sat at the table and watched the scene transpire in front of him. He states, “Yes, things like that are the only things in the world I really like. That is to say, I like things that have always been and will always be there. You see, there’s always an open fire here, and for centuries they’ve beaten dough like that.” The narrator, seeking some solace and respite from impending doom, looks for it in the ever-repeating nature of existence, the making and cooking of food, the shaping of the dough and the never extinguishing fire in the oven, each of which has existed for eons and will continue to exist long after the war.

The narrator, contemplating the fire and the chef, continues by saying, “And if you were to reproach me because I’m forever changing and going to different places, then I’d reply, that it’s only because I’m doing a thorough search for something that is going to last forever.” As a refugee, the narrator’s lives in uncertainty, the uncertainty of community, place, food, shelter, and existence itself. Gazing at the fire and chef, the narrator points out that he wants something permanent, something that the Nazis and the war can’t destroy, something that will endure, lasting forever. He knows history continues, plodding forward across the years, decades, and centuries, and that the core of existence doesn’t change. It remains in the face of annihilation.

Along with the thought of existence being a continuous line from past to present to future, the narrator also makes a pointed point about his own desire for stability amidst the chaos. He is seated with the doctor as they await the arrival of Marie, the wife of the man whom the narrator is impersonating. The narrator becomes infatuated with Marie, hoping that she will leave the doctor, whom she is seeing, and choose to spend her life with him. He knows that his pursuit of Marie is, to put it mildly, problematic, but he sees her as a way to achieve stability as instead of “forever changing and going to different places.”

Thinking about Marie later in the novel, the narrator envisions what life would be like with her once the doctor flees across the Atlantic. He sees them going to the Jardin des Plantes, eating meals with the Binnets, him getting a part-time job while she stays home, and more. He sees these images amidst the war, amidst the destruction, because he thinks about Marie standing in line for sardines, the coffee rations, and regular trips to the pizzeria for pizza and Rosé. He muses to himself, “All these ordinary things would make a powerful whole.” He seeks stability, a constant, unchanging reality.

He continues by thinking, “I’d never before wished for anything like that, having always been a wanderer and never settling down anywhere. But now, in the midst of this earthquake, the yowling of the air-raid sirens, amidst the wailing of the fleeing hordes, I longed for an ordinary life like a hungry man does for bread and water.” Throughout Transit, the narrator oscillates between leaving Marseille or remaining, carving out a life for himself in the port city. This indetermination arises because the narrator has always been, as he says, “a wanderer,” and the war provides him with an impetus to wander, but on the other hand, it also makes him think about life and the fact that he wants to not feel alone and to have stability in the face of chaos. He wants things that have always been there and will continue to be there after the war. He wants “ordinary things” because those things will make him feel alive amongst so much death and destruction.

While others he encounters over the course of his story tell him they want to go “home,” the narrator never talks about his “home,” his place or origin. He has always been on the move, from place to place, pulling his roots along the ground behind him, looking for a place to plant them in the soil. Marseille feels like that soil. The frame narrative of the novel highlights this because it begins with the narrator talking to us, the reader, in the pizzeria in Marseille, and it ends there too. The narrator has found, at least for a while, a home. He finds a place and a reality worth fighting for when he concludes his story by telling us, “Whatever happens to them will happen to me as well. . . . I intend to share the good and the bad with my new friends here, be it sanctuary or persecution. As soon as there’s a resistance movement Marcel and I intend to take up arms. Even if they were to shoot me, they’d never be able to eradicate me.”

Next post, I’ll look some at how these themes of history and instability play out in Victor Serge’s Last Times. Until then, what are your thoughts? As usual, let me know in the comments below, and make sure to follow me on Twitter at @silaslapham.