They look at me crookedly, with mockery in their eyes.
Albert tries hard to build his life in the New World. He has “so many jobs” that even his son can’t remember a least a half of them. No sooner he learns how his father earns bread and butter than he starts working “ somewhere else ”. However, nothing goes according to his plan. Time flies and he is still penniless. This fact makes him rather nervous and prevents him from living an actual life. Albert thinks that his more successful compatriots look at him “crookedly, with mockery in their eyes”. Suffering from constant – although probably imaginary – h umiliation, the man’s hearth fills with anger. He wants “the fire of God consume them” and often dreams about revenge. His suspiciousness doesn’t let him trust anyone, so he feels stressed all the time. Albert’s story is about broken dreams and bitterness of disappointment.
Then here in the new land is the same old poverty.
Albert leaves Genya and David in order to start a new life in the United States and then, when he has enough money to pay for their tickets, retrieve them. Patient waiting is the thing which is required from Genya and she is willing to do that, for she hopes for a better life. When she sees that “ here in the new land is the same old poverty ” and her husband is so unhealthily thin that it is clear as a day that he has gone “without food”. Even in that moment of bitter disappointment, Genya tries to support her husband and says ‘this is the Golden Land” even if it doesn’t even look like this.
Now time may bring something – who knows.
Albert is not always bitter and violent. There are rare occasions, when he starts believing that everything is possible again. It usually happens when the man gets a new job, which is even at least a little bit better than the previous one. Then he likes repeating “now time may bring something – who knows” and this little hope helps his to continue fighting.
This world had been created without a thought of him.
David used to think and now is fully convinced that “this world had been created without a thought of him”. It might sound sad, but it is not that bad, for he is “free”. He feels the “joy of being a boy in the city, that endless spectacle”. He is free to do what he wants, he belongs only to himself.
