in a society they themselves had created. Hilde was glad she had woken up in Bjer-
kely, at any rate.
Would she have dared to wake up in Norway without knowing whereabouts in
Norway she would wake up?
But it was not only a question of where she would wake up. Could she not just
as easily have woken up in a different age? In the Middle Ages, for instance—or in
the Stone Age ten or twenty thousand years ago? Hilde tried to imagine herself sitting
at the entrance to a cave, scraping an animal hide, perhaps.
What could it have been like to be a fifteen-year-old girl before there was
anything called a culture? How would she have thought? Could she have had thoughts
at all?
Hilde pulled on a sweater, heaved the ring binder onto the bed and settled down
to read the next chapter.
Alberto had just said “Next chapter!” when somebody knocked on the
door of the major’s cabin.
“We don’t have any choice, do we?” said Sophie.
“No, I suppose we don’t,” said Alberto.
On the step outside stood a very old man with long white hair and a
beard. He held a staff in one hand, and in the other a board on which was
painted a picture of a boat The boat was crowded with all kinds of animals.
“And who is this elderly gentleman?” asked Alberto.
“My name is Noah.”
“I guessed as much.”
“Your oldest ancestor, my son. But it is probably no longer fashionable to
recognize one’s ancestors.”
“What is that in your hand?” asked Sophie.
“This is a picture of all the animals that were saved from the Flood. Here,
my daughter, it is for you.”
Sophie took the large board.
“Well, I’d better go home and tend the grapevines,” the old man said,
and giving a little jump, he clicked his heels together in the air and skipped
merrily away into the woods in the manner peculiar to very old men now and
then.
Sophie and Alberto went inside and sat down again. Sophie began to
look at the picture, but before she had a chance to study it, Alberto took it
from her with an authoritative grasp.
“We’ll concentrate on the broad outlines first.”
“Okay, okay.”
“I forgot to mention that Marx lived the last 34 years of his life in London.
He moved there in 1849 and died in 1883. All that time Charles Darwin was
living just outside London. He died in 1882 and was buried with great pomp
and ceremony in Westminster Abbey as one of England’s distinguished sons.
So Marx and Darwin’s paths crossed, but not only in time and space. Marx
wanted to dedicate the English edition of his greatest work, Capital, to Darwin,
but Darwin declined the honor. When Marx died the year after Darwin, his
friend Friedrich En-gels said: As Darwin discovered the theory of organic
evolution, so Marx discovered the theory of mankind’s historical evolution.”
“I see.”
“Another great thinker who was to link his work to Darwin was the
psychologist Sigmund Freud. He also lived his last years in London. Freud