The Address
by Marga Minco
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'The Address' is a poignant post-War story set in Holland. During the War, the narrator's mother had entrusted the family's valuables to an acquaintance, Mrs Dorling, who lived at Number 46, Marconi Street, carrying away the silver, plates, vases and crockery 'to save them'. After the War the narrator, whose mother is dead, goes to that address to reclaim the memories of her lost life. On the first visit Mrs Dorling refuses to recognise her and turns her away. On a second visit Mrs Dorling's fifteen-year-old daughter lets her in, and the narrator sees all her mother's cherished belongings crudely and tastelessly arranged in a stuffy room. Surrounded by these objects severed from the life they once belonged to, she realises they have lost all value for her. She decides to leave everything behind, resolves to forget the address, and chooses to move on with her life.
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The story shows the human predicament that follows war, the loss of loved ones, the loss of a settled home, and the discovery that mere objects cannot restore the past. The narrator learns that once cherished possessions are torn from the life that gave them meaning, they become worthless.
The first, unwelcome visit
The narrator rings the bell at Number 46 and asks the woman who opens the door if she still knows her. The woman, wearing the narrator's mother's green knitted cardigan, denies recognition and says she cannot help her, that another time would be more convenient, clearly unwilling to return anything. The narrator recognises her mother's cardigan and knows she has come to the right place, but she is turned away.
How Mrs Dorling got the things
In a flashback the narrator recalls how, during the War, her mother had told her about Mrs Dorling, an old acquaintance who had suddenly renewed contact and each time carried away something valuable 'to save it' in case the family had to leave. The mother, trusting and unsuspecting, had given her the address, Number 46, Marconi Street, and asked the narrator to remember it. The narrator had been sceptical even then.
The second visit and the dead objects
After the Liberation the narrator, at first uninterested and even afraid of the stored possessions, finally grows curious and visits again. Mrs Dorling's daughter lets her in. In the tasteless, muggy living-room she recognises everything, the woollen table-cloth with its burn mark, the silver cutlery, the pewter plate with the apple in the still-life. But the objects, arranged so uglily and torn from their old setting, oppress rather than comfort her.
Resolving to forget
Hearing the jingle of the spoons and forks as the girl opens the drawer, the narrator suddenly wants only to leave. She realises that objects linked in memory to a familiar former life lose their value when seen in strange surroundings, and that they would be useless in her small rented room. She resolves to forget the address, of all the things she has to forget, that, she decides, will be the easiest.