Panina Manina, a circus trapeze
artist, falls and breaks her neck. As the
ringmaster bends over her he sees around
her neck an amber charm, just like the one
he gave to his own child before she was
swept away in a torrent sixteen
years before.
The theme of a father finding a long-lost
child runs through this magical novel from
the author of the international bestseller
Sophie's World. The tale is narrated by Petter,
his most intriguing creation since Sophie, a
precocious child and fantasist who grows up
to be a storyteller of disturbing mischief.
Rather than be an author himself, Petter
makes his living selling stories and ideas to
professionals suffering from writers block.
It's a lucrative trade. As he sits like a spider
at the centre of his web, Petter finds himself
in a trap of his own making.
THE
RINGMASTER'S
DAUGHTER
Also by Jostein Gaarder
Sophie's World
The Christmas Mystery
Hello? Is Anybody There?
The Solitaire Mystery
Through a Glass, Darkly
Vita Brevis
The Frog Castle
Maya
THE
RINGMASTER'S
DAUGHTER
Jostein Gaarder
Translated by James Anderson
Weidenfeld & Nicolson
London
A PHOENIX HOUSE BOOK
First published in English in Great Britain in 2002 by
Phoenix House
Copyright ? H. Aschehoug & Co (W. Nygaard) AS, Oslo 2001
Translated from the original Norwegian edition Sirkusdirektoerens datter
English translation ? James Anderson 2002
The right of Jostein Gaarder to be identified as the
author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
The right of James Anderson to be identified as the
translator of this work has been asserted by him in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted,
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior
permission of both the copyright owner and the above
publisher of this book.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library.
All author's royalties from this book will be donated to the Sophie Foundation.
The Sophie Foundation awards the annual Sophie Prize (100,000 US dollars)
for outstanding achievement in working towards a sustainable future.
www.sophieprize.org
ISBN 0 297 82923 8
Typeset at The Spartan Press Ltd,
Lymington, Hants
Printed in Great Britain by
Clays Ltd, St Ives plc
Phoenix House
Weidenfeld & Nicolson
The Orion Publishing Group Ltd
Orion House
5 Upper St Martin's Lant
London WC2H 9EA
My brain is seething. I'm bubbling with hundreds of new ideas.
They just keep welling up.
Perhaps it's possible to control thoughts to a certain extent, but to
stop thinking is asking too much. My head is teeming with
beguiling notions, I'm not able to fix them before they're ousted by
new thoughts. I can't keep them apart.
I'm rarely able to remember my thoughts. Before I manage to
dwell on one of my inspirations, it generally melts into an even
better idea, but this, too, is so fickle of character that I struggle to
save it from the constant volcanic stream of new ideas ...
Once more my head is full of voices. I feel haunted by an excitable
swarm of souls who use my brain cells to talk to one another. I
haven't the equanimity to harbour them all, some must be racked
off. I have a considerable intellectual surplus and I constantly need to
unburden it. At regular intervals I have to sit down with pencil and
paper and relieve myself of ideas ...
When I awoke a few hours ago, I was certain I'd formulated the
world's most competent adage. Now I'm not so sure, but at least
I've given the virginal aphorism a due place in my notebook. I am
convinced it could be traded for a better dinner. If Isold it to someone
who already has a name, it might make it into the next edition of
Familiar Quotations.
At last I've decided what I want to be. I shall continue doing what
I've always done, but from now on I'll make a living out of it. I
don't feel the need to be famous, that's an important consideration,
but I could still become extremely rich.
I feel sad as I leaf through this old diary. I was nineteen when
the entries above, dated 10 and 12 December 1971, were
written. Maria had left for Stockholm several days before,
she was three or four weeks pregnant. In the years that
followed we met a few times, but now it's been twenty-six
years since I last saw her. I don't know where she lives, I
don't even know if she's still alive.
If she could see me now. I had to jump aboard an early
morning flight and get away from it all. In the end, the
external pressure built up to something like the one inside
me, and so an equilibrium was achieved. I can think more
clearly now. If I'm careful I may be able to live here for a
few weeks before the net tightens around me for good.
I'm thankful I got away from the Book Fair in one piece.
They followed me to the airport, but I doubt if they were
able to discover which plane I boarded. I bought the first
empty seat out of Bologna. 'Don't you know where you
want to go?' I shook my head. 'I just want to go away,' I
said. 'On the first plane.' Now it was her turn to shake her
head, then she laughed. 'We don't get many like you,' she
said, 'but there'll be a lot more in the future, believe me.'
And then, when I'd paid for my ticket: 'Have a good
holiday! I'm sure you deserve it ...'
If only she'd known. If only she'd known what I
deserved.
Twenty minutes after my plane had taken off, another
one left for Frankfurt. I wasn't on it. I'm sure they imagined
I was heading home for Oslo, with my tail between my legs.
But it isn't always wise to take the shortest route home if
your tail is between your legs.
I've put up at an old inn on the coast. I sit staring out across
the sea. On a promontory down by the shore stands an old
Moorish tower. I watch the fishermen in their blue boats.
Some are still in the bay, hauling in their nets, others are
moving towards the breakwater with the day's catch.
The floor is tiled. The chill strikes up through my feet.
I've put three
pairs of socks on, but they're useless against
these cold floor tiles. If things don't improve soon, I'll pull
the counterpane off the big double bed and fold it to use as a
foot-rest.
I ended up here quite by chance. The first plane out of
Bologna could just as easily have been for London or Paris.
But I feel it's even more of a coincidence that, as I write, I'm
leaning over an old writing table where once, long ago,
another Norwegian ? who was also an exile of sorts ? sat and
wrote. I'm staying in a town which was one of the first
places in Europe to start manufacturing paper. The rums of
the old paper-mills are still strung out like pearls on a string
along the valley bottom. They must be inspected, of course.
But as a rule I ought to keep to the hotel. I've taken full
board.
It's unlikely anyone in these parts has heard of The
Spider. Here everything revolves around tourism and
lemon growing, and fortunately both are out of season. I
see that some visitors are paddling in the sea, but the bathing
season hasn't yet begun and the lemons need a few more
weeks to ripen.
There is a phone in my room, but I have no friends to
confide in, there have been none since Maria left. I could
hardly be labelled a friendly person, or a decent one, but I do
at least have one acquaintance who doesn't wish me dead.
There was an article in the Corriere della Sera, he said, and
after that everything seemed to start falling apart. I decided
to get away early next morning. On the flight south I had
leisure enough to think back. I am the only one who knows
the full and complete extent of my activities.
I've decided to tell all. I write in order to understand
myself and I shall write as honestly as I can. This doesn't
mean that I'm reliable. The man who passes himself off as
reliable in anything he writes about his own life has
generally capsized before he's even set out on that hazardous
voyage.
As I sit thinking, a small man paces about the room. He's
only a metre tall, but he's fully grown. The little man is
dressed in a charcoal-grey suit and black patent leather
shoes, he wears a high-crowned, green felt hat and, as he
walks, he swings a small bamboo cane. Now and then he
points his cane up at me, and this signifies that I must hurry
up and begin my story.
It is the little man with the felt hat who has urged me to
confess everything I can remember.
It will certainly be more difficult to kill me once my mem-
oirs are out. The mere rumour that they are being penned
would sap the courage of even the boldest. I'll ensure that
such a rumour is circulated.
Several dozen dictaphone cassettes have been securely
deposited in a bank box - there, now that's out - I won't say
where, but my affairs are in order. I've collected almost one
hundred voices on these tiny cassettes, so these already have
an acknowledged motive for murdering me. Some have
made open threats, it's all on the cassettes, which are
numbered consecutively from I to XXXVIII. I have also
devised an ingenious index that makes it easy to locate any
one of the voices. I have been prudent, some might even call
it cunning. I'm certain that hearsay about the cassettes has
saved my skin for a couple of years now. Supplemented by
these jottings, the little miracles will have even greater value.
I don't mean to imply that my confessions, or the cas-
settes, will be any guarantee of safe conduct. I imagine I'll
travel on to South America, or somewhere in the East. Just
now I find thoughts of a Pacific island alluring. I'm insular
anyway, I've always been insular. To me there's something
more pathetic about being isolated in a big city than on a
small island in the Pacific.
I became wealthy. It was no surprise to me. I may well be
the very first person in history to have plied my particular
trade, at least in such a big way. The market has been limit-
less, and I've always had merchandise to sell. My business
wasn't illegal, I even paid a certain amount of tax. I lived
modestly, too, and can now afford to pay substantial tax
arrears should the matter ever arise. It wasn't an unlawful
trade from my customers' point of view either, just
dishonourable.
I realise that from this day forth I'll be poorer than most
because I'll be on the run. But I wouldn't have swapped my
life for that of a teacher. I wouldn't have swapped it for an
author's life, either. I'd have found it hard to live with a
definite career.
The little man is making me nervous. The only way to
forget him is to get on with my writing. I'll begin as far back
as I can remember.
Little Petter Spider
I believe I had a happy childhood. My mother didn't think
so. She was informed of Petter's unsociable behaviour even
before he started school.
The first serious chat my mother was summoned to, was
at the day nursery. I'd sat there all morning just watching the
other children play. But I hadn't felt bad. It had amused me
to see how intensely they lived. Many children find it fun to
watch lively kittens, canaries or hamsters; I did too, but it
was even more fun to watch lively children. And then, I was
the one controlling them, I was the one deciding everything
they did or said. They didn't realise it themselves, neither
did the nursery assistant. Sometimes I'd have a temperature
and have to stay at home and listen to the Stock Exchange
prices. At times like these nothing at all would happen at the
day nursery. The children would just keep getting in and
out of their jump suits, in and out. I didn't envy them. I
don't think they even had any elevenses.
I only saw my father on Sundays. We went to the circus.
The circus wasn't bad, but when I got home I'd begin to
plan a circus of my own. That was far better. It was before
I'd learnt to write, but I assembled my own favourite circus
in my head. No problem there. I drew the circus as well, not
just the big top and the seats, but all the animals and circus
performers too. That was hard. I wasn't good at drawing. I
gave up drawing long before I began school.
I sat on the big rug barely moving a muscle, and my
mother asked me several times what I was thinking about. I
said I was playing circuses, which was the truth. She asked if
we oughtn't to play something else.
'The girl on the trapeze is called Panina Manina,' I said.
'She's the ringmaster's daughter. But no one at the circus
knows it, not even her, or the ringmaster.'
My mother listened intently, she turned the radio down,
and I went on: 'One day she falls off the trapeze and breaks
her neck. It's the final performance, when there aren't any
more people in town who want to buy tickets for the circus.
The ringmaster stoops over the poor girl, and just then he
sees she has a slender chain around her neck. On the chain is
an amber trinket, and inside the trinket is a spider that's
millions of years old. When he sees this, the ringmaster
realises that Panina Manina is his own daughter, because he
bought her that rare trinket on the day she was born.'
'So at least he knew he had a daughter,' my mother
interjected.
'But he thought she'd drowned,' I explained. 'You see,
the ringmaster's daughter fell into the River Aker when she
was eighteen months old. At the time she was just plain
Anne-Lise. After that the ringmaster had no idea she was still
alive.'
My mother's eyes widened. It was as if she didn't believe
my story, so I said: 'But luckily she was saved from the
freezing cold water by a fortune-teller who lived all alone in
a pink caravan by the river, and from that day on the
ringmaster's daughter lived in the caravan together with the
fortune-teller.'
My mother had lit a cigarette. She stood there disporting
herself in a tight-fitting costume. 'Did they really live in a
caravan?'
I nodded. 'The ringmaster's daughter had lived in a circus
trailer ever since she'd been born. So she'd have found it far
stranger to move into a modern block of flats on an estate.
The fortune-teller had no idea what the little girl's name
was, so she christened her Panina Manina, the name she's
kept to this day.'
'But how did she get back to the circus?' my mother
asked.
'She grew up,' I said. 'That's easy enough to understand.
Then she went to the circus on her own two feet. That
wasn't the least bit difficult, either. This all happened before
she became paralysed!'
'But she could hardly remember that her father was a
ringmaster,' my mother protested.
I felt a pang of despair. It wasn't the first time my mother
had disappointed me; she really could be quite dense.
'We've been over this already,' I said. 'I told you that she
didn't know she was the ringmaster's daughter, and the
ringmaster didn't know either. Of course he couldn't
recognise his daughter when he hadn't seen her since she
was one and a half.'
My mother thought I should rethink that part, but there
was no need. 'On the day the fortune-teller fished the ring-
master's daughter from the river, she stared into her crystal
ball and foretold that the little girl would become a famous
circus performer and so, one fine day, the girl made her way
to the circus on her own two feet. Everything a real fortune-
teller sees in her crystal ball will always come true. That was
why the fortune-teller gave the girl a circus name, and
taught her some fine trapeze tricks, too, to be on the safe
side.'
My mother had stubbed her cigarette out in an ashtray on
the green piano. 'But why did the fortune-teller need to
teach her ...?'
I cut in: 'When Panina Manina arrived at the circus and
demonstrated her abilities, she was given a job on the spot,
and soon she was as famous as Abbott and Costello. But the
ringmaster still had no idea she was his daughter. If he had,
he certainly wouldn't have allowed her to do all those risky
stunts on the trapeze.'
'Well, I give up,' my mother said. 'Shall we go for a walk
in the park?'
But I went on: 'The fortune-teller's crystal ball had also
told her that Panina Manina would break her neck at the
circus, and a genuine prophecy is impossible to avert. So she
packed up all her belongings and went to Sweden.'
My mother had gone into the kitchen to fetch something.
Now she was standing in front of the piano with a large
cabbage in her hand. It most definitely wasn't a crystal ball.
'Why did she go to Sweden?' she asked in amazement.
I'd thought about that. 'So that the ringmaster and the
fortune-teller wouldn't have to bicker about who Panina
Manina should live with after she'd broken her neck and
couldn't look after herself any more,' I said.
'Did the fortune-teller know that the ringmaster was the
girl's father?' my mother asked.
'Not until Panina Manina was on her way to the circus,' I
explained. 'Only then did the crystal ball tell her that the girl