The Time of the Goats

8

49 8 Changa felt ­ elated when he left our house late at night, some­ times just be­ fore dawn, books ­ tucked under his arm. Happy, he ­ rushed to his goats, ­ played with them, ­ milked them, and got them ready for pas­ ture. While they ­ grazed, he read to the goat­ herds from ­ Father’s books. The goat­ herds lis­ tened at­ ten­ tively, ­ though from time to time they would tilt their heads, doubt­ ful and sim­ ply un­ able to be­ lieve what was in the books. After all, how was it pos­ sible for these goats, now peace­ fully graz­ ing, to be so mixed up in the his­ tory of man­ kind and the ­ planet? They­ doubted even more some­ thing ­ Changa swore was true: goats ­ nursed lion cubs. The news ­ spread ­ quickly ­ through the city that ­ Changa read to the goat­ herds while graz­ ing his goats. ­ Changa was not just any­ body. His move­ ments were fol­ lowed vig­ i­ lantly by the po­ lice, his words by the party, and his goats by the govern­ ment. ­ Changa in­ flicted un­ imag­ in­ able tor­ ment on the party ca­ dres as­ signed to the con­ fi­ den­ tial goat file.­ Within the party, it was the ac­ quain­ tance and friend­ ship ­ between­ Changa and my ­ father that ­ caused the most sur­ prise and worry. It was a 50 thorn in the ­ party’s side. What could pos­ sibly bring these two non­ party mem­ bers to­ gether, new­ com­ ers to the city, one a ­ university-educated in­ tel­ lec­ tual, the other an il­ lit­ er­ ate goat­ herd? But no­ body re­ al­ ized that it was the goats that had ­ brought my ­ father and ­ Changa to­ gether. This friend­ ship was a sore point to every­ one in power—the party and the po­ lice. The party ca­ dres re­ spon­ sible were­ afraid even to con­ sider this friend­ ship, be­ cause what was hap­ pen­ ing­ between my ­ father and ­ Changa was pre­ cisely what they were fight­ ing­ against: a bond ­ forged by the goats ­ between the de­ feated class and the vic­ to­ ri­ ous one. In the near fu­ ture, the goat­ herds must be­ come the work­ ing class! That is what the su­ preme lead­ ers had im­ a­ gined, it is what they had or­ dered. First, the party must pre­ pare the peo­ ple for the peace­ ful de­ struc­ tion of the goats and block any plans to the ­ contrary. But who could stop ­ Changa’s love for the goats, for peo­ ple, and for life? Every­ one ­ feared ­ Changa’s power and in­ flu­ ence. While they did in fact want to stop him and his goats due to the “high­ est inter­ ests of the party,” se­ cretly, they ­ wanted in equal meas­ ure for ­ Changa and his goats to stay, be­ cause they were ex­ tremely use­ ful to the party and to the rul­ ing pow­ ers as well. As they tried to under­ stand, they asked them­ selves, What con­ nected my ­ father and ­ Changa? What sort of con­ spir­ acy were they hatch­ ing? The party func­ tion­ ar­ ies spe­ cial­ iz­ ing in the goat ques­ tion well knew what the il­ lit­ er­ ate ­ Changa could do with the goats, but they had not con­ sid­ ered what he could do if he be­ came lit­ er­ ate, armed with new knowl­ edge about the goats. They wrote ­ strictly con­ fi­ den­ tial re­ ports based on the in­ for­ ma­ tion they often re­ ceived ­ through se­ cret chan­ nels about the anti­ class al­ li­ ance ­ between my ­ father and ­ Changa, the in­ tel­ lec­ tual and the goat­ herd. The young party mem­ bers, hun­ gry for rapid ad­ vance­ ment in their ca­ reers, went fur­ thest in their spec­ u­ la­ tions. They knew even the ti­ tles of­ Father’s books in ­ Changa’s pos­ ses­ sion. Had they ­ wished, they could have rid them­ selves once and for all of my ­ father and his friend­ ship with­ Changa ­ solely on the basis of a list of his books. 51 He could eas­ ily have been ­ charged with pos­ sess­ ing ­ pro-Western prop­ a­ ganda and spread­ ing cap­ i­ tal­ ist...