The subtitle of the novel The Commander (Was there ever An Empty Tomb?) reads: The Spirit of the Narrative, also in the
role of The Spirit of Revelation, has in this novel endeavored to distinguish,
experience and reveal the character and accomplishments of The One who could
have been or was the Commander.
A boy bears witness to the first
encounter between an orthodox priest and a Spanish soldier (a political school commissar
in the Spanish civil war), denounced as a Trotskyist for mentioning Stalin’s
Gulags. In the novel, each one of them wants to, in their own way, express and
note their own idea and line of ascent – on how one can help a human being and
his miserable earthly existence in recognizing and sensing that immortal spark (which actually is God’s
energy), in order for him to lead a happier life and so that the human being
itself could have a reason to be born.
World War II has come to the south of Serbia , and Španac
(the Spaniard) organizes the first partisan units. It will be shown that the
supreme headquarters of the Communist Party, led by Josip Broz, had proclaimed
him to be a Trotskyist, surrounded by soldiers who had participated in the Spanish
civil war. A command from the supreme headquarters, received by the district
secretary of the Communist Party, states that all Trotskyists should be executed,
one by one. Because he is favored by the people, Španac was to be separated
and sent to another part of the country, and thus made to disappear. At the
same time, the boy’s teacher, consumed by religious feelings, desires, in the
personage of a Serbian priest, to discover and demonstrate both the evil and
the good that befalls the Serbian people while the revolutionary battles
continues. The boy, in the role of The
Spirit of the Narrative, witnesses in his early years a meeting between
Španac and the priest – who was to become one of the most renowned religious enlighteners
among the Serbian people. Both The Spirit of the Narrative, i.e. the boy, and
his teacher and later – the Professor, want and try, in their own way, to tell
where the truth lies and who is right. What is that quintessential thing that
helps the Serbian people endure not only in the World War II and the revolution
but – as the priest would say – always.
In the dialogs, and in certain
situations – the particular problem is the one that is not mentioned
publicly: what happened on Golgotha and whether the dead man from Nazareth really ascended
to heaven. There, where the God’s energy was created, the one who is blessed
enough to be touched by that light or those wandering waves – is capable of
feeling happiness and loving life.
Tendentiously, one of the most
significant biblical motives, as indistinguishable markings of the fate of
human beings on Earth – is not mentioned in the novel. This: on Golgotha , there were two bandits alongside Christ, not
just one. Christ takes one of them with him to heaven, and John the Baptist
explains it to the people: in Christ’s words, it was not me who did it, it was
my father. The first bandit was a revolutionary, convicted as a fighter against
the Roman authority. The other one was a murderer. History will recognize the
revolutionary in young Bonaparte and Karađorđe, and other similar figures in
other nations, all the way to Che Guevara. In The Commander, Španac is the symbol of such a figure.
The ending of the novel may well
provide some kind of answer to the question posed by the Spirit of the Narrative, which the student asks his teacher: whether
the Professor was, even in the role of the priest and at least on some
occasions – apprehensive about the idea or the dream – or even just a vision – of
the Empty Tomb. Perhaps the only
answer the Professor could give was – while lying down on the bed in Novi Breg,
in the room where the boy was born, instead of a response – his silence, as he stared
at the fresco of the White Angel on
the wall.
And this: how and why was Josip Broz,
while following Stalin’s method, killing Serbian
trotskysts during the war and the revolution?
“Draslar Partner”, 2017