Telegrams of the Soul (11 page)

He stood up and gave her his hand: “Adieu—.”

“Adieu—,” said the woman.

She thought: “He looks just like a noble Tartar—.

I revealed my youth to him—! What for?! I made my confession before the fire goes out—.”

The little white lacquered hall wafted with the scent of women's garments. The Tartar stood still. He peered down the curl of the black cast-iron stairway and saw at the bottom the wondrous pierced black cast-iron elevator cage, to which three black coils of wire were attached dangling down into an abyss.

He felt: “Anita—.” And again he became a mirror for his fellow man, soaking it all up and beaming it back!

And then he thought of the trees in a forest that nobody needs, that grow down into the earth and up into the sky with rustling leaves and blossoms.

And he thought of the people who are not somebody's “pretty object,” but rather, like forest trees, great free entities unto themselves with rustling souls and spirit blossoms! And they wilt and sag, like forest trees, and collapse in upon themselves and become humus for the spring. This is how they beget—offspring, life springing off of them! They, the fall that feeds the spring. The tall freewheeling trees in the human forest, the sturdy trunks that won't become chopped firewood, but grow down into the earth and up into the sky! Amen—.

For a long time now I've judged people only according to minute details. I am, alas, unable to await the ‘great events' in their life through which they will ‘disclose' their true selves. I am obliged to predict these ‘disclosures' in the little things of life. For instance, in the walking stick handle, the umbrella handle which he or she selects. In the necktie, in the cloth of a dress, in the hat, in the dog which he or she owns, in a thousand unlikely incidentals all the way down to the cufflinks, actually all the way up! For everything is an essay about the person who selected it and gladly dons it! He discloses himself to us! “He wrote a good book, but he wore uncouth, engraved, unnatural cufflinks!” That says everything about him. There's something rotten somewhere in the “state of his soul!” That a beloved lady betray us is not the most important thing. For fate will surely punish her after the fact with profound disappointment! But her first coquettish, fire-kindling glance, that is the salient detail! I can compete with him who betrayed me, absolutely, but not with him who directed a desirous glance in her direction! Little things kill! Fulfillment can always be defeated, but never anticipation! Therefore I hold fast to the little things in life, to neckties, umbrella handles, walking stick handles, stray remarks, neglected gems, pearls of the soul that roll under the table and are picked up by no one! The significant things in life have absolutely no importance. They tell, they make known nothing more about being than we ourselves already know about it! Since when you get right down to it, everything works by and large the same way. But the important differences are only manifest in the details! For instance, which flowers you give to your beloved. Or which belt buckle you pick out for her among the hundred options. Which pear from France, which grapefruit from America you bring to her house, which speckled brown Canada apple you select for her among the hundreds on display; this attests to many more attachments than the orgies of so-called love! Aesthetics, understanding, love must ultimately form a triad. One must be inclined to allow a symphony of ordinary life to resound in the sum
of the “little things”! One cannot wait for big events to happen! All the least consequential things are monumental! The squeak of a mouse caught in a trap is a terrible tragedy! Somebody once said to me: the most terrible thing is a young rabbit dragged into a fox hole. The little foxes gnaw at him alive, slowly, day and night, with their needle-sharp little teeth! These are the tragedies of our existence!

Little things in life supplant the “great events.” That is their value if you can fathom it!

I have a steel-tipped pen rest made of long black bundled bristle set in a light blue shimmering opalized matte glass jar. Protection in an ideal mantel. I think of the Society for the Protection of Children. Something tender, useful, softly and tenderly preserved. I swaddle my ungrudging elastic Kuhn pen like a little child in its cradle, certain that nothing bad will befall it. It dries and rests. And the little glass jar in which the bristle holder sits is an iridescent blue, the color of waves breaking against the sun. And the steeltipped pen and pen rest return my love, my tenderness, quietly letting it be.

The adagios in the violin sonatas of Beethoven.

The voice and the laughter of Klara and Franzi Panhans.

Speckled tulips.

Franz Schubert.

Solo asparagus, spinach, new potatoes, Carolina rice, salt sticks.

Knut Hamsun.

The intelligence, the soul of Paula Sch.

The blue pen “Kuhn 201.”

The condiment: Ketchup.

My little room Number 33: Vienna, First District, Dorotheergasse, Graben Hotel.

The good looks of
A.M
.

Gmunder Lake, Wolfgang Lake.

The Vöslauer
*
Baths.

The Schneeberg
†
train.

Mondsee boxed cheese, fresh curdled.

Sole, perch, young hake, reinanken.

Money.

Hansy Klausecker, thirteen years old.

__________________

*
Vöslau, a spa near Vienna

†
Schneeberg, an Austrian mountain resort

The
International Collectors News
features an interesting inquiry on the value of collecting in its recently published issue Number 13. The journal includes contributions by, among others, Minister of Education Count Stürgkh, Alfred Lichtwark, Alma Tadema, Harden, Paul Heyse, Max Kalbeck, Eduard Pötzel, Felix Salten, Balduin Groller, Ginzkey. In response to the question as to the why and wherefore of his passion for collecting, Peter Altenberg offered the following intriguing answer: “It's a wonder you should turn to me of all people concerning this subject. Since you could not possibly know that I, a poor man, have for many years been an absolutely fanatic collector and have, just like the millionaires, managed through abundant sacrifices to amass a cherished, painstakingly selected, exquisite gallery of pictures: 1,500 postcards, 20 Hellers apiece, in two lovely Japanese cabinets, each with six compartments. They are exclusively photographic images of landscapes, women, children and animals. Some weeks ago I realized that the truly cultivated individual had to divest himself of his treasures so as to be able to experience while still alive that most profound, that peerless pleasure of ‘giving,' of ‘bestowing' a thing of value upon a ‘beneficiary.' Consequently, I shipped both Japanese cabinets along with the 1,500 postcards collected since 1897 to a young woman in Hamburg, the only one among all women able to appreciate such a present. Since then I've been collecting all the more ardently, all the more passionately, so as to complete my lady friend's collection.—Here then are two healthful deflections from the perilously leaden weight of one's own self: first the pleasure of collecting in and of itself, second the pleasure of being able to do so on behalf of another equally discerning person! ‘Collecting' means being able to concentrate on something situated outside the sphere of one's own personality, yet something not quite so perilous and thankless as a beloved woman—.”

Baudry de Saunier's
The Art of Driving

 

Why do all the splendid things conceived, dreamed up by the godlike human brain so soon degenerate into grotesque chicaneries?!? For the very reason that everywhere you look in this earthly existence there's heaven and hell, the deceptive devil and guardian angel side by side!

Nobody who loves the fresh air of nature, the forest and field, the evening and morning, the lazy, easygoing afternoon and the forceful vibrant magnificence before noon, nobody eager to catch a glimpse of a deer in the early evening on the edge of the woods, of hungry crows in a snowy field, of the blossoming and wilting bushes bordering endless streets, the stormy symphonies of mountain streams and the noble, discreet silence of homogeneous groves of trees, nobody so inclined would speed through the world in his holy private luxury automobile and, thereby, endanger his fellow man, animals and himself!

Could you imagine Beethoven, Goethe, Kant speeding along, you men of means?

To let life slowly flow into you, that's all there is to life! Everything else is the pitiful attempt to elude at a speedy clip God's indictment of your failure to grasp the beauties of this world, for lack of eye, ear, time! The noble horse and buggy in the Prater that can tear along at a speedy clip, still leaves us the pleasure of the morning dew on the meadow, the lonely woods, the old head waters of the Danube, of pebble banks in modern faded tones of gray-brown-blue, of old pastures and cawing crow rookeries. But the speeding automobile wants to whisk away what's left of your already overly burdened soul! It wants to abduct your own sense of peace with a meanspirited spurt of speed! Roll on, destiny's children, at the tempo of a rubber-tired hack on the Praterhauptallee, cherish the riches of nature more than the pace of your passage, and above all read: Baudry de Saunier's
The Art of Driving
!

I admit it. I have a fanatic attachment to particularly striking walking sticks, it might even be the onset of an incipient mania in which one's entire lust for life is henceforth linked to lovely walking sticks. Forest, lake, spring, winter, woman, art—all fade away, and there's only one still thrilling thing left: your lovely walking stick! Even though, in my case, I do not suspect this insidious devolution of a predilection, every pet feeling in our nervous system can, alas, evolve, or realign itself into an
idée fixe.
The fact is, I know all the walking sticks for sale in Vienna, have my own special favorites in each establishment, sticks which, strange at it may seem, are the least likely to be bought by someone else. Does that surprise you, Peter Altenberg, you with your eccentric taste?! A young woman once gave me as a gift one of these passionately coveted walking sticks which stood for two years in the display case. It was made of light gray spayed goat horn and sugar cane. A remarkably successful product made in Vienna in the English style, it cost only eleven Crowns. The dear young donor sewed me a sheath of fine deer hide with brown silk for the handle.

But then they kidded in café and restaurant: “What's wrong with your Sir Stick?! Did he catch a cold in inclement weather?!?”

Somebody said: “Peter Altenberg, you're striking enough as is. Enough already with these forced efforts to make yourself ridiculous. The effect is self-evident!”

My walking stick was often knocked over. One time a man said: “Don't look so reproachful, you think I did it on purpose?!”

“No,” I replied, “I don't think so; for what reason would you have to deliberately knock down my poor walking stick?!”

“There, you see, just be a little sensible,” said the man and pardoned me.

As a consequence of these painful occurrences, I brought my beloved walking stick back each week to the little shop in which it had been bought and asked them to make good the damages through polishing etc., etc. The salesman always replied politely: “In two to three days! No charge for the repairs!” After a while I
realized that he took me for a “walking stick nut” and never even thought of sending the stick back for repair. He always said: “That's exactly how the stick came from the ‘factory'! It's as if you'd divined it!” One time I noticed a tiny nick.

“But this nick is still there,” I humbly maintained.

“Yes, well, that's an innate function of the organic structure of the goat horn cell tissue itself, even our factory can't iron it out—.”

Then I thought: If they had seriously filed, grated, polished it down, there would be nothing left today of my wondrous spayed goat horn handle. How can I thank you enough for your considerate wisdom: “He's a stick-nut! Better handle with kid gloves!”

I ran into an important politician in the Stadtpark. “Well, that's all very interesting, but everyone of you writers has a screw loose!”

“Well, for heaven's sake, that's the tool of our trade. The shoemaker has a shoemaker's bench, or else he wouldn't be able to make any shoes. We have a screw loose, or else we wouldn't be able to be any different from the others and would be unable, therefore, to communicate anything special to them that they don't already know!”

“But what about those writers with no screw loose?!”

“Writers, precisely, my dear sir, they are not!”

“For once you actually seem to hit the nail on the head. Why just the other day when I went for a walk in the woods with one of those famous ‘altogether normal' ones, and he suddenly screamed on the verge of despair: ‘These woods are too green for me, too green, much much too green!' it first dawned on me and I recognized that he was a real great writer!”

“On the contrary, that one, in particular, was a just a fool! Any man for whom the woods are too green is no writer, but rather a fool! He really has no screw loose. He's a perfectly normal fool!”