Alan
Leitman writes Einstein’s Dreams as a
series dreamed from mid-April to the end of June 1905. In each dream time works
in some mysterious way in and around the neighborhoods of Berne and Fribourg. On
June 2, the dream is of a world in which time moves backwards. We see the body
of an old woman gradually come alive and gain vitality. She slowly forms
relationships and grows younger. One day the body of her husband is brought in
and they live together and everything is proceeding apace until the reader
stumbles upon the following: “She sees her husband for the first time in the
library of the university.”
It seems to me she is seeing her husband for
the last time. She sees him for the first time when his near-dead body is
brought in from the hospital. Similarly Leitman shows an old man throwing dirt
into a friend’s grave, looking forward to their many happy days of friendship
ahead. I think I understand what Leitman is doing: showing people living life
backward, but still experiencing life in ways people (readers) living in normal
time can relate to.
I know there’s no way of avoiding
absurdities when doing this sort of thing, and Lietman walks a fine line, keeping
it wistful and evocative. But he makes me want to conduct my own little thought
experiment with this one.
If time runs backwards people spontaneously
gather at a graveside to witness an exhumation. Religious rites are conducted,
the body is taken to a mortuary and given transfusions of body fluids.
Eventually the corpse comes to life. Depending upon its initial conditions, in
a matter of days, weeks, months or years the person attains a degree of health
and intelligence. People grow “younger,” forget their knowledge, shrink, are
one day forced into the womb of a young woman, and are never seen again.
