Tales of the German Imagination from the Brothers Grimm to Ingeborg Bachmann (Penguin Classics) (8 page)

Nathaniel staggered off starry-eyed, with all of heaven’s splendour bursting from his breast. Spalanzani’s party was the talk of the town in the days that followed. Notwithstanding the Professor’s great pains to make it a splendid occasion, the chatterboxes nevertheless dwelt on all sorts of unseemly and strange goings-on, saving their sharpest barbs for the stiff and silent Olympia, who, despite her lovely exterior, was saddled by the wagging tongues with a lot of completely nonsensical notions as to her sanity – the reason, it was said, that Spalanzani kept her hidden for so long. Needless to say, Nathaniel was not
pleased to learn of this, and he said nothing; what was the point, he reasoned, in proving to these dullards that it was their own nonsense that kept them from recognizing Olympia’s profound and beautiful spirit!

‘I beg you, my friend,’ Siegmund said to him one day, ‘tell me how in heaven’s name an intelligent man like you ever fell for the wax face of that wooden doll?’

Nathaniel was about to explode in anger, but then he pulled himself together and calmly responded: ‘Why don’t
you
tell me, brother Siegmund, how a fellow with an eye for beauty could be blind to Olympia’s heavenly charms? But then again, it’s just as well fate didn’t make you a rival; for one of us would have to fall in blood.’

Fathoming how things stood with his friend, Siegmund backed off and, after observing that in matters of beauty and love all is in the eye of the beholder, he added: ‘Still it’s funny that so many of us feel pretty much the same way about Olympia. She seemed to us – don’t take it badly, my friend! – strangely stiff and soulless. Her figure’s regular, just like her face, it’s true! She might well be considered beautiful, if her gaze were not so devoid of life, so totally lacking, you might say, the power of sight. Her step is strangely measured, every movement seems prescribed by clockwork gears and cogs. Her playing and singing have the unpleasantly precise soulless rhythm of a machine, which is true of her dance step too. This Olympia seemed completely odd to us, we didn’t know how to take her; it was as if she were only acting like a living being, and yet she unquestionably has her own way about her.’

Nathaniel refused to give in to the bitter feelings that welled up in his heart at Siegmund’s words. He checked his mood and simply replied, deadly serious: ‘Olympia may indeed seem odd to you cold, prosaic types. The poetic temperament only reveals itself to like-minded souls! Her loving look fell on
me
alone, lighting up my senses and thoughts; only in Olympia’s love can I find myself again. You all think ill of her because she doesn’t babble banalities like all the other shallow souls. It’s true, she speaks little; but those few words seem like true hieroglyphs revealing an inner world replete with love and a profound
intellectual grasp of the eternal beyond. But you just don’t understand, all these words are lost on you.’

‘Beware, my brother,’ said Siegmund very softly, almost sadly, ‘it seems to me you’re heading in a dangerous direction. You can count on me, if all else – no, I dare not say any more!’ Nathaniel suddenly fathomed that the cold, prosaic Siegmund was being very sincere with him, and so he took and shook the proffered hand with all his heart.

Nathaniel had completely forgotten that there was a Clara in this world whom he once loved; his mother, Lothar, everyone had slipped from his consciousness, he only lived for Olympia, beside whom he sat for hours every day, and to whom he held forth on his love, on a life flushed with sympathy, on their psychic affinity – to all of which Olympia listened with deep devotion. From the depths of his desk drawers Nathaniel fetched out everything he had ever written. Poems, fantasies, visions, novels, stories, to which were added daily all sorts of high-flown sonnets, stanzas,
canzone
– all of it he tirelessly read to Olympia for hours on end.

But he had never had such a lovely listener. She did not embroider and knit, she did not peer out of the window, she fed no birds, she played with no lapdogs or cuddly cats, she practised no paper-cutting or did anything else with her hands, she held back no furtive yawns with a quiet, forced cough – in short, for hours and hours she peered with a fixed and steady gaze into the eye of her beloved without fidgeting or budging, and her gaze grew ever livelier and more intense. Only when Nathaniel finally stood up and kissed her on the hand, and even on the mouth, did she respond: ‘Oh, oh!’ Followed with: ‘Good night, my dear!’

‘Oh you beautiful, oh you profound spirit,’ Nathaniel cried out when he reached his room, ‘only you, you alone completely understand me.’ He experienced an inner bliss when he pondered what a wondrous harmony manifested itself ever more each day between his and Olympia’s spirits; for it seemed to him as if Olympia had grasped his works, his poetic gift, from the depths of her soul, indeed that her voice came from the bottom of her innermost self. That must be true, he thought; for
Olympia never uttered any more words than those already noted above. But when, at his most lucid moments, for instance in the morning upon waking, Nathaniel really pondered Olympia’s total passivity and laconic manner, he shrugged it off: ‘What are words – words! Her heavenly gaze says more than any hollow language. Can any child of heaven fit herself into the narrow compass of a pitiful earthly need?’

Professor Spalanzani seemed to be absolutely delighted by the relationship between his daughter and Nathaniel; he gave them all sorts of unequivocal signs of his approval and when Nathaniel finally dared to allude to a future bond with Olympia, a smile spread over Spalanzani’s face and he replied that he would leave it to his daughter to decide of her own free will. Emboldened by these words, with burning desire in his heart, Nathaniel decided to implore Olympia the very next day to declare clearly in plain words what her dear loving look had long since told him, that she wished to be his for evermore. He searched for the ring that his mother had given him when he left home to give to Olympia as a symbol of his commitment to their budding, blossoming life together. While looking for it he happened on Clara’s and Lothar’s letters; indifferent, he flung them aside, found the ring, stuffed it in his pocket and ran over to see Olympia.

Even from the doorstep, and from the vestibule, he heard a strange din; it appeared to emanate from Spalanzani’s study. A stamping of feet – a clatter – a shoving – a pounding on the door, interspersed with coarse words and hurled imprecations. ‘Let go! Let me go! You wretch! You cursed creature! Did I put my life and limb on the line for that?’ – ‘Ha ha ha ha! – that was not our arrangement – it was me, me who made the eyes!’ – ‘And I the mechanical clockwork!’ – ‘Poor devil with your clockwork – you filthy cur of a simple-minded clockmaker!’ – ‘Get out! – Satan! – Stop!’ – ‘Organ grinder!’ – ‘Devilish beast! – Stop – Get out – Let go!’ It was the voices of Spalanzani and that disgusting Coppelius that screeched and raged.

Nathaniel burst in, gripped by an unspeakable terror. The Professor held a female figure by the shoulders, the Italian Coppola held her by the feet; they tugged and tore her here and
there, furiously fighting for possession. Nathaniel recoiled in profound horror when he recognized the figure as Olympia; flaring up in a wild fit of anger, he was about to tear his beloved out of their struggling grip – but at that very moment, with a mighty burst of strength, Coppola managed to yank the figure free of the Professor’s hands and, with a pivot, swinging her in his direction, managed to land Nathaniel such a stunning blow that it made him tumble backwards over the work table, toppling and knocking down the phials, retorts, bottles and measuring glasses. All the equipment smashed in a thousand pieces on the floor. Then Coppola flung the figure over his shoulder and raced with a repulsive, shrill laugh down the steps, so that the ugly dangling feet of the figure banged with a wooden thud and thump on the steps. Stunned, Nathaniel stood up – he had seen all too clearly that Olympia’s deathly pallid wax face had no eyes, but black hollows in their stead; she was a lifeless doll.

Spalanzani thrashed around on the floor; glass shards had cut his head, chest and arms, blood spurted as though from a fountain. But he pulled himself together. ‘After him – after him – why do you waver? Coppelius – Coppelius has robbed me of my finest automaton – twenty years’ work – life and limb invested – the clockwork – speech – step – all mine – the eyes – the eyes robbed from you. Cursed hellhound! After him – fetch me back Olympia – there are her eyes!’

Then Nathaniel spotted a pair of bloody eyes peering at him from the floor. Spalanzani grasped them with his uninjured hand and flung them at him so that they struck him on the breast. Then madness grabbed him with its burning claws and bored its way into his heart of hearts, tearing his thinking and feeling to shreds. ‘Hopla – hopla – hopla! – ring of fire – ring of fire! Spin around, ring of fire – merrily – merrily! – wooden doll, hopla, lovely little wooden doll – turn turn!’ – whereupon he flung himself at the Professor and pressed his fingers to his throat. He would have strangled him, but, roused by the racket, many people stormed in, tore the raging Nathaniel from the Professor’s neck, managed to revive the old man and thereby saved his life. As strong as he was, Siegmund was not able to restrain the
madman, who kept on screaming in a terrifying voice: ‘Wooden doll, turn, turn!’ and lashed about him with balled fists. Finally, it took the combined strength of many men to overpower him, fling him to the floor and tie him up. His words dissolved in a terrible beastly bellowing. In this pitiful state, still raving in a ghastly frenzy, he was taken to the madhouse.

But before I continue, gracious reader, with my account of the fate of that poor unfortunate, Nathaniel, those of you who took an interest in the masterful mechanic and maker of automatons, Spalanzani, can rest assured that he completely recuperated from his wounds. He was forced to leave the university, as Nathaniel’s story had stirred up a public uproar and it was commonly held to be an altogether fraudulent swindle to try to pass off a wooden doll for a living person in proper society (for Olympia had effectively pulled the wool over their eyes). Jurists went so far as to call it a refined, and, therefore, all the harder to punish, swindle, which he succeeded in pulling off so skilfully that everyone (except for a few sharp-eyed students) was taken in, although they now put on a smart façade and pointed out all sorts of things that seemed suspicious to them at the time. But such smart-alecs ultimately brought no hard and fast evidence to the case. For instance, could it possibly have aroused anyone’s suspicion that, according to the testimony of one elegant invitee, Olympia more often sneezed than yawned? This, maintained said elegant invitee, was the automaton’s hidden rewind mechanism that noticeably creaked in the process, etc.

A professor of poetry and rhetoric took a pinch of snuff, snapped the tin shut, cleared his throat and launched into his erudite discourse: ‘Most honoured ladies and gentlemen, can’t you see where the shoe pinches? The whole thing is an allegory – a long-drawn-out metaphor! You catch my drift!
Sapienti sat!
’

But many honoured gentlemen derived little consolation from this view; the story of the automaton had taken root and a dreadful distrust of human figures seeped into their souls. In order to be completely convinced that they were not in love with a wooden doll, quite a few lovers demanded that their beloved sing something off-key and dance out of step, that they
embroider and knit while being read to, play with Bowser, etc., and above all that they not just listen, but also occasionally say something in such a way as to demonstrate that their words necessarily derive from actual thought and feeling. Consequently the loving bond of many couples grew stronger and all the more attractive, but others quietly drifted apart. ‘One can hardly be held accountable for this,’ was the common excuse. Yawning was all the rage at social teas, but people refrained from sneezing, so as to dispel any suspicions. Spalanzani was obliged to leave the town, as has already been said, to escape the criminal investigation into his fraudulent introduction of an automaton into human society. Coppola also vanished.

When Nathaniel awakened, as though from an oppressive and terrible dream, he batted his eyes open and felt himself infused with an indescribable sense of well-being and heavenly warmth. He lay in his bed in his room in his father’s house; Clara was bent over him and his mother and Lothar stood close by.

‘At last, at last, oh my dearly beloved Nathaniel, you’ve pulled through at last, and now you’re mine again!’ Clara spoke the words with all her heart and took Nathaniel in her arms.

But bright, burning tears of sadness and rapture poured from his eyes and he moaned deeply: ‘My Clara, my Clara!’ Siegmund, who had faithfully stood by his friend in dire moments, entered the room. Nathaniel held out his hand: ‘You, my faithful brother in need, you never abandoned me.’

Every last trace of madness was gone, and soon Nathaniel got better in the painstaking care of his mother, his beloved and his friends. Fortune had in the meantime returned to the house; for a miserly old uncle, from whom no one hoped to inherit a penny, had died and left Nathaniel’s mother, in addition to a considerable fortune, a small estate in a pleasant district not far from the city. There they intended to move together, mother, Nathaniel with his Clara, whom he now planned to marry, and Lothar. Nathaniel had become more gentle and childlike than ever and only now really recognized Clara’s heavenly pure, radiant spirit. No one reminded him, not even breathing the slightest hint, of the recent past.

It was only when Siegmund prepared to leave that Nathaniel
spoke up: ‘By God, my brother, I was heading down the path of no return, but in the nick of time an angel made me find the right way! It was my Clara, after all!’ Siegmund cut him off, fearing that bitter memories might once again make him start raving.

The time approached when the four happy people planned to move out to the small country estate. At midday they went walking through the streets of the city, having bought some things. The tall town hall tower cast a long shadow over the market place. ‘Oh!’ said Clara, ‘let’s climb it one last time and gaze out at the distant mountains!’ No sooner said than done! Nathaniel and Clara both climbed the steps, mother went home with the maid, and Lothar, who was disinclined to mount the many steps, stayed down below. Now the two lovers stood arm in arm at the tower’s highest lookout gallery and peered at the sweet-scented ring of woods, beyond which the blue mountains loomed like a giant city.