The Loser (10 page)

downtrodden and despised
, he said, but instead of an answer he finds the same hideousness, he said, I thought. After visiting Floridsdorf and Kagran twenty or thirty times, so Wertheimer often said, I recognized my mistake and went to the
Bristol
instead and watched people of my own kind. Again and again we try to escape ourselves, but we fail in our efforts, constantly run our heads into the wall because we don’t want to recognize that we can’t escape ourselves, except in death. Now he’s escaped himself, I thought, and in a more or less unappetizing manner. To stop at fifty, fifty-one at the latest, he once said. In the end he took himself
seriously
, I thought. We observe a fellow student walking in the corridor, I thought, and address him and have started a so-called lifelong friendship. Naturally we don’t know right away that it is a so-called lifelong friendship because at first we experience it only as an interested friendship, one that we have to have at that moment to get ahead, but then again it’s not just any person we’ve addressed but the only possible one at that moment, I thought, for I had hundreds of opportunities to address other students, who all studied at the Mozarteum and many of whom had taken Horowitz’s course back then, but I addressed Wertheimer and no one else, reminding him that we had once met and spoken with each other in Vienna, I thought, which he remembered. Wertheimer studied primarily in Vienna, not like me at the Mozarteum, but at the Vienna Academy, which the Mozarteum has always considered the better music conservatory, just as the Vienna Academy has always considered the Mozarteum the more useful school, I thought. Students always judge their own school to be something less than it is and cast an envious glance at their rival school, above all music students are known for always giving much higher marks to their rival schools than to their own, and the Viennese music students always thought and believed the Mozarteum to be better, just as the Mozarteum students thought the Vienna Academy was better. Basically the Vienna Academy and the Mozarteum had and have always had equally good or equally bad teachers, I thought, it has always been up to the students to exploit these teachers with extreme ruthlessness for their own purposes. It doesn’t even depend on the quality of our teachers, I thought, it’s up to us, for even bad teachers have always produced geniuses in the end, just as good teachers have destroyed geniuses, I thought. Horowitz had a sterling reputation, we had answered the call of this sterling reputation, I thought. But we had no idea of Glenn Gould, what he meant for us. Glenn Gould was a student like everyone else, initially endowed with remarkable promise, finally with the greatest talent that has ever existed in this century, I thought. For me taking Horowitz’s course wasn’t the catastrophe it was for Wertheimer, Wertheimer was too weak for Glenn. Seen that way, Wertheimer, by enrolling in Horowitz’s course, walked into a
trap for life
, I thought. The trap snapped shut the first time he heard Glenn play, I thought. Wertheimer never got out of this trap for life. Wertheimer should have stayed in Vienna and continued studying at the Vienna Academy, the word Horowitz destroyed him, I thought, indirectly the
concept Horowitz
, even if Glenn actually destroyed him. When we were in America I told Glenn that he had destroyed Wertheimer, but Glenn had no idea what I meant. Never again did I bother him with this thought. Wertheimer had gone to America only against his will, during the trip he continually let me know that he basically detested artists who, in Wertheimer’s own words, had taken their art as far as Glenn had, who destroyed their personalities to be geniuses, as Wertheimer expressed himself then. In the end people like Glenn had turned themselves into
art machines
, had nothing in common with human beings anymore, only seldom reminded you of human beings, I thought. But Wertheimer continually envied Glenn this art, he wasn’t capable of marveling at it without envy, even if not admiring it, for which I also lacked and still lack all capacity, I’ve never admired anything but have marveled at many things during my life and, I can say, have marveled most in my life, which perhaps deserves the name of an artist’s life, at Glenn, with true enthusiasm I marveled at his development, I marveled at him again and again, absorbed, as they say, his interpretations, I thought. I was always capable of letting my sense of marvel roam free, not letting myself be limited, hemmed in, by anybody or anything in my sense of marvel, I thought. Wertheimer never had this ability, in absolutely no respect, I thought. Unlike Wertheimer, who quite probably would have liked to be Glenn Gould, I never wanted to be Glenn Gould, I always only wanted to be myself, but Wertheimer belongs to the kind of person who constantly and all his life and to his constant despair wants to be someone else, someone, as he always believes, more favored in life, I thought. Wertheimer would have liked to be Glenn Gould, would have liked to be Horowitz, probably also would have liked to be Gustav Mahler or Alban Berg. Wertheimer wasn’t capable of seeing
himself as a unique and autonomous being
, as people can and must if they don’t want to despair; no matter what kind of person, one is always a unique and autonomous being, I say to myself over and over, and am rescued. Wertheimer was never able to seize hold of this rescue anchor, that is to consider himself a unique and autonomous being, he lacked all capacity for that. Every person is a unique and autonomous person and actually, considered independently, the greatest artwork of all time, I’ve always thought that and should have thought that, I thought. Wertheimer didn’t have that possibility, and so he always only wanted to be Glenn Gould or, yes, Gustav Mahler or Mozart and comrades, I thought. That plunged him into unhappiness at a very early stage, again and again. We don’t have to be a genius to be a unique and autonomous being and to be able to recognize that, I thought. Wertheimer was an unrelieved
emulator
, he emulated anybody he thought was better off than he was, although he didn’t have the capacity for that, as I now see, I thought, he’d absolutely wanted to be an artist and thus walked into the mouth of disaster. Hence also his restlessness, his constant urgent walking, running, his inability to stand still, I thought. And he took his unhappiness out on his sister, whom he tormented for decades, I thought, locked away in his head, as it seemed to me, never again to let her out. At the so-called
recital evenings
, which students in the concert business are used to and which all take place in the so-called
Wiener Saal
, we once performed together,
playing Brahms for four hands
, as they say. Throughout the concert Wertheimer had wanted to assert himself and thus thoroughly wrecked the concert. Wrecked it absolutely on purpose, as I see today. After the concert he said
excuse me
and these two words were just like him. He was incapable of playing with someone else, he had wanted, as they say, to
shine
, and because naturally he couldn’t manage it, he wrecked the concert, I thought. All his life Wertheimer always wanted to assert himself, something he’s never managed to do, in no way, under no circumstances. As a result he had to kill himself, I thought. Glenn wouldn’t have had to kill himself, I thought, for Glenn had never had to assert himself, he simply asserted himself always and everywhere and under all circumstances. Wertheimer always wanted more without being up to it, I thought, Glenn was up to everything. I’m not putting myself in question here, but for my part I can say that I was always capable of everything possible, but on the whole purposely avoided using this capacity, always out of indolence, arrogance, laziness, boredom, I thought. But Wertheimer never was up to anything he attempted, nothing and double nothing, as they say. Except that he was up to being an unhappy person. In this respect it’s not surprising that Wertheimer killed himself and Glenn didn’t and I didn’t, although Wertheimer predicted
my
suicide over and over, like so many others who always let me know that
they
knew
I
would kill myself. Wertheimer actually played better than all the other students at the Mozarteum, that has to be said, but after hearing Glenn that wasn’t enough for him. The level Wertheimer played at can be reached by anyone who sets himself the goal of becoming famous, achieving mastery over his instrument, if he spends the necessary decades of work at his piano, I thought, but when he comes across a Glenn Gould and has heard
such
a Glenn Gould play, he’s a broken man if he’s like Wertheimer, I thought. Wertheimer’s funeral didn’t even last an hour. At first I had wanted to put on a so-called dark suit for his funeral, but then I decided to go to the funeral in my traveling clothes, it had suddenly struck me as ridiculous to adapt myself to a sartorial mourning convention I’ve always hated, as I have all sartorial conventions, so I went to the funeral in the clothes I had on when I started my trip to Chur, in my usual suit. At first I had thought I would walk to the Chur cemetery, but then I got into a taxi and had myself driven to the main gate. I had carefully pocketed the telegram from Wertheimer’s sister, whose name is now Duttweiler, for it stated the exact time of the funeral. I’d thought that it was an accident, that Wertheimer had perhaps been run over by a car in Chur, since I wasn’t aware of Wertheimer having any acute or life-threatening illness I had considered every possible kind of accident, above all however traffic accidents, which are so common today, but it didn’t occur to me that he could have committed suicide. Although this thought, as I now see, I thought, would have been the most logical one. That the Duttweiler woman sent the telegram to my address in Vienna and not to Madrid surprised me, for how could Wertheimer’s sister have known that I was in Vienna and not in Madrid, I thought. It still isn’t clear to me how she knew she could reach me in Vienna and not in Madrid, I thought. Perhaps she did have some contact with her brother before his suicide, I thought. Of course I also would have come from Madrid to Chur, I thought, even if that would have been more difficult. Or perhaps wouldn’t have been, since Chur is a stone’s throw from Zurich. I again showed several people my apartment in Vienna, which I’ve wanted to sell for years without ever finding the appropriate buyer, the ones who showed up this time were also out of the question. Either they don’t want to pay the price I’m asking or they withdraw for other reasons. I had intended to sell my apartment in Vienna
as it stands
, that is everything in it, but for that all prospective buyers had to look me in the face and not one of them was able to look me in the face, as they say. I also wondered whether it wasn’t senseless to part with my Vienna apartment just
now, in these difficult times
, to give it up in a time of total uncertainty. No one is selling now if they’re not absolutely forced to, I thought, and I wasn’t forced to sell my apartment. I still have Desselbrunn, I had always thought, I don’t need the Vienna apartment, for I live in Madrid and I’m not planning to return to Vienna, ever, I had always thought, but then I saw the horrible faces of all those buyers and lost all idea of selling my Vienna apartment. And in the final analysis, I thought, Desselbrunn won’t be enough in time, it’s better to have one foot in Vienna and one in Desselbrunn, than to have just Desselbrunn, and I thought that in fact I wouldn’t return to Desselbrunn, but I won’t sell Desselbrunn either. I won’t sell the Vienna apartment and I won’t sell Desselbrunn, I’ll give up the Vienna apartment, which of course I’ve already given up, just as I’ll give up and have already given up Desselbrunn, but I won’t sell Vienna or Desselbrunn, I thought, I don’t need to. If I’m honest I actually have enough of a cushion not to have to sell Desselbrunn or Vienna, to sell nothing at all. I’d be an idiot to sell, I thought. And so I have Vienna and I have Desselbrunn, even if I don’t use Vienna or Desselbrunn, I thought, but in the background I have Vienna and Desselbrunn and as a result my independence is a much greater independence than if I didn’t have Vienna or Desselbrunn, or didn’t have Vienna
and
Desselbrunn, I thought. The funerals that aren’t supposed to be noticed are scheduled for five o’clock in the morning, I thought, and Frau Duttweiler as well as the cemetery officials in Chur had wanted to avoid any commotion with Wertheimer’s funeral. Wertheimer’s sister said several times that her brother’s funeral was
merely provisional
, she intended one day
to transport
her brother to Vienna, to have his remains put in the Wertheimer family grave in the cemetery in Döbling. At the moment, however, transporting her brother was out of the question, she didn’t say why, I thought. The Wertheimer crypt is one of the biggest in the Döbling cemetery, I thought. Perhaps
next fall
Wertheimer’s sister, Frau Duttweiler, had said, I thought. Herr Duttweiler had worn tails, I thought, and led Wertheimer’s sister to the grave, which had been dug completely at the other end of the Chur cemetery, that is at the edge of the garbage heap. Since no one said anything and the pallbearers lowered the coffin with Wertheimer into the grave with unbelievably quick and deft movements, the funeral didn’t last more than twenty minutes. A man dressed in black who apparently worked for the funeral home, was undoubtedly also the owner of the funeral establishment, I thought, had wanted to say something, but Herr Duttweiler had cut his speech off even before he had begun his speech. I hadn’t been able to buy flowers for the funeral, in my entire life I’ve never done that, the fact that the Duttweilers also hadn’t brought any flowers was all the more depressing, probably, I thought, because Wertheimer’s sister was of the opinion that flowers weren’t fitting for her brother’s funeral, and this opinion was correct, I thought, even if this fully flowerless funeral had a chilling effect on all present. Herr Duttweiler gave each pallbearer two bills while they were still standing beside the open grave, which seemed a crude gesture but nonetheless fit the whole funeral procedure. Wertheimer’s sister looked down in the grave, her husband didn’t, I didn’t either. I walked out of the cemetery behind Herr and Frau Duttweiler. Before the gate they both turned to me and extended an invitation to have lunch with them, which however I didn’t accept. That certainly wasn’t correct, I thought now in the inn. I probably could have learned something important and useful from both of them and particularly from Wertheimer’s sister, I thought, but I took my leave and suddenly stood there alone. Chur no longer interested me and I went to the station and left for Vienna with the next train. It is completely natural that we should think about the deceased intensively after a funeral, especially if he was a close friend, even more especially if he was an intimate friend with whom we have been linked for decades, and a so-called school friend is always an extraordinary companion in our lives and existences because he is so to speak a