Berlin Stories Page 7
1907
Mountain Halls
Do you know the mountain halls on Unter den Linden? Perhaps you’ll try going there someday. The price of admission is a mere thirty cents. Even if you see the cashier eating bread or sausage, you needn’t turn away in disgust, instead just take into account that it’s her supper she’s eating. Nature demands its rights everywhere. Wherever Nature is found, there is meaning. And now you’ll step inside, going into the mountains. And here you will encounter a huge figure, a sort of Rübezahl or mountain spirit—he’s the publican here, and you’ll do well to salute him by doffing your hat. He appreciates such gestures, and he’ll thank you courteously for your politeness by half rising from the chair on which he sits. Flattered in your soul, you now approach the glacier, which is the stage: a geological, geographical, and architectural curiosity. As soon as you’ve sat down, you’ll receive a drink proposal tendered by a perhaps moderately pretty waitress. Well, no use being dissatisfied with what’s available. Even on theater nights, there may be no great abundance here of feminine charms. Watch out that not too many glasses of apple wine sloshed and splashed to the brim are grouped about your paying person. The girls are all too quick to attach themselves to gentlemen who pity them. Pity is unsuitable when it’s a matter of artistic enjoyment. Have you been attending to the performance of this dancer? Kleist too waited many years for recognition. Go ahead and applaud valiantly, even if it almost displeased you. Now, what have you done with your alpenstock? Left it at home? Next time, for better or worse, you’ll have to come properly equipped when you head to the mountains, just in case. One cannot be too careful. And who is this ravishing alpine-shepherd’s-hut princess now approaching with dainty step? It’s the resident sweet young thing, and she’s hoping you’ll treat her to a walloped-full glass of beer to the tune of fifty cents. Will you be able to resist these lips, these eyes, this sweet, foolish request? You’d be lamentable if you could. Now the crevasse in the glacier-stage opens once more before you, and a Danish songstress sprinkles you with notes and snowflakes of grace. You’re just taking a sip of your cow-warm mountain milk. The publican is making his watchful bouncer rounds through the establishment. He sees to decorum and proper behavior. Do pay the place a visit, why don’t you, eh? You might even meet me again someday there. But I shan’t even recognize you. It’s my habit to sit there in silence, under a magic spell. I quench my thirst, melodies rock me to sleep, I dream.
1908
The Little Berliner
Papa boxed my ears today, in a most fond and fatherly manner, of course. I had used the expression: “Father, you must be nuts.” It was indeed a bit careless of me. “Ladies should employ exquisite language,” our German teacher says. She’s horrible. But Papa won’t allow me to ridicule her, and perhaps he’s right. After all, one does go to school to exhibit a certain zeal for learning and a certain respect. Besides, it is cheap and vulgar to discover funny things in a fellow human being and then to laugh at them. Young ladies should accustom themselves to the fine and the noble—I quite see that. No one desires any work from me, no one will ever demand it of me; but everyone will expect to find that I am refined in my ways. Shall I enter some profession in later life? Of course not! I’ll be an elegant young wife; I shall get married. It is possible that I’ll torment my husband. But that would be terrible. One always despises oneself whenever one feels the need to despise someone else. I am twelve years old. I must be very precocious—otherwise, I would never think of such things. Shall I have children? And how will that come about? If my future husband isn’t a despicable human being, then, yes, then I’m sure of it, I shall have a child. Then I shall bring up this child. But I still have to be brought up myself. What silly thoughts one can have!
Berlin is the most beautiful, the most cultivated city in the world. I would be detestable if I weren’t unshakably convinced of this. Doesn’t the Kaiser live here? Would he need to live here if he didn’t like it here best of all? The other day I saw the royal children in an open car. They are enchanting. The crown prince looks like a high-spirited young god, and how beautiful seemed the noble lady at his side. She was completely hidden in fragrant furs. It seemed that blossoms rained down upon the pair out of the blue sky. The Tiergarten is marvelous. I go walking there almost every day with our young lady, the governess. One can go for hours under the green trees, on straight or winding paths. Even Father, who doesn’t really need to be enthusiastic about anything, is enthusiastic about the Tiergarten. Father is a cultivated man. I’m convinced he loves me madly. It would be horrible if he read this, but I shall tear up what I have written. Actually, it is not at all fitting to be still so silly and immature and, at the same time, already want to keep a diary. But, from time to time, one becomes somewhat bored, and then one easily gives way to what is not quite right. The governess is very nice. Well, I mean, in general. She is devoted and she loves me. In addition, she has real respect for Papa—that is the most important thing. She is slender of figure. Our previous governess was fat as a frog. She always seemed to be about to burst. She was English. She’s still English today, of course, but from the moment she allowed herself liberties, she was no longer our concern. Father kicked her out.
The two of us, Papa and I, are soon to take a trip. It is that time of the year now when respectable people simply have to take a trip. Isn’t it a suspicious sort of person who doesn’t take a trip at such a time of blossoming and blooming? Papa goes to the seashore and apparently lies there day after day and lets himself be baked dark brown by the summer sun. He always looks healthiest in September. The paleness of exhaustion is not becoming to his face. Incidentally, I myself love the suntanned look in a man’s face. It is as if he had just come home from war. Isn’t that just like a child’s nonsense? Well, I’m still a child, of course. As far as I’m concerned, I’m taking a trip to the south. First of all, a little while to Munich and then to Venice, where a person who is unspeakably close to me lives—Mama. For reasons whose depths I cannot understand and consequently cannot evaluate, my parents live apart. Most of the time I live with Father. But naturally Mother also has the right to possess me at least for a while. I can scarcely wait for the approaching trip. I like to travel, and I think that almost all people must like to travel. One boards the train, it departs, and off it goes into the distance. One sits and is carried into the remote unknown. How well-off I am, really! What do I know of need, of poverty? Nothing at all. I also don’t find it the least bit necessary that I should experience anything so base. But I do feel sorry for the poor children. I would jump out the window under such conditions.
Papa and I reside in the most elegant quarter of the city. Quarters which are quiet, scrupulously clean, and fairly old, are elegant. The brand-new? I wouldn’t like to live in a brand-new house. In new things there is always something which isn’t quite in order. One sees hardly any poor people—for example, workers—in our neighborhood, where the houses have their own gardens. The people who live in our vicinity are factory owners, bankers, and wealthy people whose profession is wealth. So Papa must be, at the very least, quite well-to-do. The poor and the poorish people simply can’t live around here because the apartments are much too expensive. Papa says that the class ruled by misery lives in the north of the city. What a city! What is it—the north? I know Moscow better than I know the north of our city. I have been sent numerous postcards from Moscow, Petersburg, Vladivostok, and Yokohama. I know the beaches of Belgium and Holland; I know the Engadine with its sky-high mountains and its green meadows, but my own city? Perhaps to many, many people who inhabit it, Berlin remains a mystery. Papa supports art and the artists. What he engages in is business. Well, lords often engage in business, too, and then Papa’s dealings are of absolute refinement. He buys and sells paintings. We have very beautiful paintings in our house. The point of Father’s business, I think, is this: the artists, as a rule, understand nothing about business, or, for some reason or other, they aren’t allowed to understand anythin
g about it. Or it is this: the world is big and coldhearted. The world never thinks about the existence of artists. That’s where my father comes in, worldly-wise, with all sorts of important connections, and in suitable and clever fashion, he draws the attention of this world, which has perhaps no need at all for art, to art and to artists who are starving. Father often looks down upon his buyers. But he often looks down upon the artists, too. It all depends.
No, I wouldn’t want to live permanently anywhere but in Berlin. Do the children in small towns, towns that are old and decayed, live any better? Of course, there are some things there that we don’t have. Romantic things? I believe I’m not mistaken when I look upon something that is scarcely half alive as romantic. The defective, the crumbled, the diseased; e.g., an ancient city wall. Whatever is useless yet mysteriously beautiful—that is romantic. I love to dream about such things, and, as I see it, dreaming about them is enough. Ultimately, the most romantic thing is the heart, and every sensitive person carries in himself old cities enclosed by ancient walls. Our Berlin will soon burst at the seams with newness. Father says that everything historically notable here will vanish; no one knows the old Berlin anymore. Father knows everything, or at least, almost everything. And naturally his daughter profits in that respect. Yes, little towns laid out in the middle of the countryside may well be nice. There would be charming, secret hiding spots to play in, caves to crawl in, meadows, fields, and, only a few steps away, the forest. Such villages seem to be wreathed in green; but Berlin has an Ice Palace where people ice-skate on the hottest summer day. Berlin is simply one step ahead of all other German cities, in every respect. It is the cleanest, most modern city in the world. Who says this? Well, Papa, of course. How good he is, really! I have much to learn from him. Our Berlin streets have overcome all dirt and all bumps. They are as smooth as ice and they glisten like scrupulously polished floors. Nowadays one sees a few people roller-skating. Who knows, perhaps I’ll be doing it someday, too, if it hasn’t already gone out of fashion. There are fashions here that scarcely have time to come in properly. Last year all the children, and also many grown-ups, played Diabolo. Now this game is out of fashion, no one wants to play it. That’s how everything changes. Berlin always sets the fashion. No one is obliged to imitate, and yet Madam Imitation is the great and exalted ruler of this life. Everyone imitates.
Papa can be charming, actually, he is always nice, but at times he becomes angry about something—one never knows—and then he is ugly. I can see in him how secret anger, just like discontent, makes people ugly. If Papa isn’t in a good mood, I feel as cowed as a whipped dog, and therefore Papa should avoid displaying his indisposition and his discontent to his associates, even if they should consist of only one daughter. There, yes, precisely there, fathers commit sins. I sense it vividly. But who doesn’t have weaknesses—not even one, not some tiny fault? Who is without sin? Parents who don’t consider it necessary to withhold their personal storms from their children degrade them to slaves in no time. A father should overcome his bad moods in private—but how difficult that is!—or he should take them to strangers. A daughter is a young lady, and in every cultivated sire should dwell a cavalier. I say explicitly: living with Father is like Paradise, and if I discover a flaw in him, doubtless it is one transferred from him to me; thus it is his, not my, discretion that observes him closely. But Papa may, of course, conveniently take out his anger on people who are dependent on him in certain respects. There are enough such people fluttering about him.
I have my own room, my furniture, my luxury, my books, etc. God, I’m actually very well provided for. Am I thankful to Papa for all this? What a tasteless question! I am obedient to him, and then I am also his possession, and, in the last analysis, he can well be proud of me. I cause him worries, I am his financial concern, he may snap at me, and I always find it a kind of delicate obligation to laugh at him when he snaps at me. Papa likes to snap; he has a sense of humor and is, at the same time, spirited. At Christmas he overwhelms me with presents. Incidentally, my furniture was designed by an artist who is scarcely unknown. Father deals almost exclusively with people who have some sort of name. He deals with names. If hidden in such a name there is also a man, so much the better. How horrible it must be to know that one is famous and to feel that one doesn’t deserve it at all. I can imagine many such famous people. Isn’t such a fame like an incurable sickness? Goodness, the way I express myself! My furniture is lacquered white and is painted with flowers and fruits by the hands of a connoisseur. They are charming and the artist who painted them is a remarkable person, highly esteemed by Father. And whomever Father esteems should indeed be flattered. I mean, it is worth something if Papa is well-disposed toward someone, and those who don’t find it so and act as if they didn’t give a hoot, they’re only hurting themselves. They don’t see the world clearly enough. I consider my father to be a thoroughly remarkable man, that he wields influence in the world is obvious.—Many of my books bore me. But then they are simply not the right books, like, for example, so-called children’s books. Such books are an affront. One dares give children books to read that don’t go beyond their horizons? One should not speak in a childlike manner to children; it is childish. I, who am still a child myself, hate childishness.
When shall I cease to amuse myself with toys? No, toys are sweet, and I shall be playing with my doll for a long time yet; but I play consciously. I know that it’s silly, but how beautiful silly and useless things are. Artistic natures, I think, must feel the same way. Different young artists often come to us, that is to say, to Papa, for dinner. Well, they are invited and then they appear. Often I write the invitations, often the governess, and a grand, entertaining liveliness reigns at our table, which, without boasting or willfully showing off, looks like the well-provided table of a fine house. Papa apparently enjoys going around with young people, with people who are younger than he, and yet he is always the gayest and the youngest. One hears him talking most of the time, the others listen, or they allow themselves little remarks, which is often quite droll. Father over-towers them all in learning and verve and understanding of the world, and all these people learn from him—that I plainly see. Often I have to laugh at the table; then I receive a gentle or not-so-gentle admonition. Yes, and then after dinner we take it easy. Papa stretches out on the leather sofa and begins to snore, which actually is in rather poor taste. But I’m in love with Papa’s behavior. Even his candid snoring pleases me. Does one want to, could one ever, make conversation all the time?
Father apparently spends a lot of money. He has receipts and expenses, he lives, he strives after gains, he lets live. He even leans a bit toward extravagance and waste. He’s constantly in motion. “Clearly he’s one of those people who find it a pleasure and, yes, even a necessity, to constantly take risks.” At our house there is much said about success and failure. Whoever eats with us and associates with us has attained some form of smaller or greater success in the world. What is the world? A rumor, a topic of conversation? In any case, my father stands in the very middle of this topic of conversation. Perhaps he even directs it, within certain bounds. Papa’s aim, at all events, is to wield power. He attempts to develop, to assert both himself and those people in whom he has an interest. His principle is: He in whom I have no interest damages himself. As a result of this view, Father is always permeated with a healthy sense of his human worth and can step forth, firm and certain, as is fitting. Whoever grants himself no importance feels no qualms about perpetrating bad deeds. What am I talking about? Did I hear Father say that?
Have I the benefit of a good upbringing? I refuse even to doubt it. I have been brought up as a metropolitan lady should be brought up, with familiarity and, at the same time, with a certain measured severity, which permits and, at the same time, commands me to accustom myself to tact. The man who is to marry me must be rich, or he must have substantial prospects of an assured prosperity. Poor? I couldn’t be poor.
It is impossible for me and
for creatures like me to suffer pecuniary need. That would be stupid. In other respects, I shall be certain to give simplicity preference in my mode of living. I do not like outward display. Simplicity must be a luxury.
It must shimmer with propriety in every respect, and such refinements of life, brought to perfection, cost money. The amenities are expensive. How energetically I’m talking now! Isn’t it a bit imprudent? Shall I love? What is love? What sorts of strange and wonderful things must yet await me if I find myself so unknowing about things that I’m still too young to understand. What experiences shall I have?
1909
Translated by Harriet Watts
Flower Days