Eastbound

by Maylis de Kerangal

Doesn’t he know that in hostile territory the solution is always collective? Who does he think he is? Before he runs, he still has to get past his filthy ignorance and know where he’s putting his feet.

the night that never closes completely here, but stays ambiguous, charged with an electric luminosity that always makes you think day is about to break.

this young soldier also embodies the entire country, he’s an archive of all the Russian wars—“the homeland our mother, the war our stepmother,”

Come, let’s take a photo. With a tightness in her throat Hélène holds onto Aliocha who puffs up his chest—they hold each other side by side, posing together, it’s the provodnitsa who photographs them before embracing them together, and on the screen, they look like each other, they have the same faces.