Correction

by Thomas Bernhard

  When he spoke, it was only by indirection, he’d always been my philosopher, it was on his account that I always came down to Stocket from Altensam, the idea of thinking came to me in my first hesitant, then determined encounters with this man who’d always been my highest authority, my philosopher who had taught me to think, most unobtrusively, at first, but from the first with a decided firmness that endured. I’m no philosopher, he’d always said. He had a preference for old clothes, early rising, and washing in cold water. He placed Novalis above everything. Nature, not yet polluted by human beings, hence his early rising. A minimal breakfast, thick socks his sister had knitted from raw, untreated wool, and one of Novalis’s ideas. Time was to him only a means toward the constant study of time. Must I be with another person? he always answered: no, I need be with no other person. This question and this answer of his do more to explain his character than mine, so Roithamer. We admire a man like my uncle, who killed himself because he could no longer endure the unhappiness of mankind, as he wrote on the slip of paper they found in his coat pocket, dated by him on the day he threw himself down the air shaft of the cheese factory, because he’s ahead of us in having the capacity to commit suicide, not only to talk about committing suicide but to commit suicide in fact, so Roithamer. It’s always those upon whom we’d hung our hopes, so Roithamer, who kill themselves, those whose talent and personality we loved and whose presence was the most pleasing and most familiar to us, so Roithamer. Then: I often woke up in the night and asked myself, how high are the costs of building, actually? what if the costs of building the Cone exceed my means, on the one hand exceeding my financial means, on the other hand exceeding my intellectual means? How often I came unrecognized to Austria and to Altensam and stayed in the Kobernausser forest, in the wooden shack I put up myself on the spot I’d picked out as the site for the Cone, in the precise center of the Kobernausser forest, so Roithamer. And very often I came from England to Altensam, unrecognized, and into the Kobernausser forest and stayed there, at its very center, for days and once even for weeks, totally concentrated on the Cone and then went back just as unrecognized to England, to Cambridge. Several times, “several times” underlined, I started to write a letter to my sister, but I never finished writing those letters because I had to keep the Cone a secret from my sister, of course, and if I did drop a hint to her, and I had in fact dropped a hint several times, she’d think I was crazy, even my beloved sister thought I was crazy, so Roithamer, which is why I had to keep silent always about the Cone, even toward my sister. The edifice that was to bring me deep gratification but to my sister the highest, the supreme happiness, so Roithamer. Such a letter about the Cone would have been sure to have frightened her. What a lot of ideas go into the making of the Cone, all adding up to the idea of the Cone. He, Roithamer, I can see that now, lived in fear that he might go mad deep inside the Kobernausher forest, on precisely the geometrical centerpoint in the middle of the Kobernausser forest he had himself determined, because he had a bent in that direction, “bent”

  underlined. Like his sister, he inclined to sudden madness, from sudden overstrain of his whole being, he feared that from overstraining his head he’d suddenly go mad. He’d decided at once on the size of the Cone and on the character of the interior, but he could no longer recall the exact point in time, to pinpoint that moment now, after so many years, “after so many years”

  underlined, he found impossible. We must remember the onlookers who note our moment of weakness, mental weakness, in so enormous an effort, and use it to kill us, so Roithamer. We must never let up in intensity. Time is realization, idea, despair, and vice versa, so Roithamer. But I mustn’t act exclusively in accordance with my plan and a dead geometry, so Roithamer.

  It’s all right to hesitate, but never out of even the slightest weakness.

  Everything is equally important, whether it’s the idea (as a whole) or its smallest constituent. Actually always the simultaneous contemplation of the idea, I must contemplate everything at the same time and train myself in this simultaneity of contemplation in such a way that I come to see everything ever more clearly, nothing less sharply focused than anything else, so that the edifice exists (in my head) and then I must move it out of my head onto the geometric point. The question is, will I achieve my aim in my own way by talking, or not, or will it turn out to be only resignation as a fact, so Roithamer. Resignation, weakness, emptiness, the failure to make it real. It’s all a matter of schooling oneself, a school in which I am both the teacher and the pupil, and in the intensity between the two there’s one’s logical consistency, there’s the Cone. My lucidity peaks at night, an exceptional condition of my head, so Roithamer, then in the morning the Cone falls apart in my head. Always assuming that my idea of the Cone corresponds precisely to my sister’s needs, her character, her nature.

  Novalis: the Cone is not what she is at this point, it is rather everything about her, corresponding to her eyes and ears, her hearing, feeling, intelligence, alertness, attention. Corresponding. It is the fact itself which dumbfounds and benumbs, not the rest of it, so Roithamer. And so I’ve never talked with a soul in Altensam (including father) about the Cone, though they all know that I’m building the Cone, they’ve all heard of it. Such a building changes the man who is building it, by the ways in which he speeds the work along and completes it. I used to be open to everything before I had the idea (of building the Cone), but now I’m nothing but the victim of the man who is building the Cone. If my head had known, so Roithamer. It seems that one’s head keeps being draw irresistibly to the most impossible problems, every time, to prove itself, so ‘ Roithamer. If we don’t, every time, involve ourselves in the most problematic undertakings, we’re lost, there’s nothing left, so Roithamer. What then follows is the catastrophe of breakdown, whatever our idea was about deserts us when we sleepwalkers awaken in the middle of what we were doing, so Roithamer.

  Once we recognize the process, it’s already broken off, nothing’s left but a man who’s been destroyed, killed. We retreat to an idea, possibly the only idea we know nothing about, so Roithamer. We try to grasp the things we experience mentally. If I don’t work hard enough, ‘m destructive, if I work too hard, I’m destructive, so Roit amer. The question always arises, whether it’s the right moment. We see everything ridiculously interrelated, from England, from Altensam, in the middle of the Kobernausser forest. e have an idea, in the end it’s nothing, so Roithamer. Once he actually went as far as his sister’s door, in order to admit everything about the Cone to her, three o’clock in the morning, so Roithamer, I’ll wake her up and explain. But at four o’clock I laughed out loud and went back to my room. And if another man should faithfully follow my notes, my plans, everything I’ve got in my head, in executing the Cone, it still wouldn’t be the same Cone, so Roithamer. But if I had neglected my scientific work, genetic mutations, I’d also have neglected building the Cone, as it is, by not neglecting my scientific teaching and studies, I also did not neglect the building of the Cone. For I was actually (most intensely) occupied with building the Cone in the Kobernausser forest while I was working my hardest on genetic mutations in Cambridge, and vice versa (March 3). The cause of work for and intensification of the one, the cause of work for and intensification of the other, so Roithamer, I never asked myself whether I am neglecting my scientific work by pushing on with building the Cone, and vice versa, it was a question I dared not ask myself, so Roithamer. The time was as favorable to my Cone building as it was for my scientific work, I achieved all I could, so Roithamer. Now I’ve left science and the Cone to nature, so Roithamer. Just as no one will ever set foot inside the Cone again, so no one will enter into my scientific work. That it’s possible to consider and act simultaneously upon two (seemingly) contradictory opposites, so Roithamer. To make full use of one’s mental state in every case and at every moment and never weaken in that direction, so Roithamer. We may not question our actions, so Roithamer.

  Juxtapose my lack of symp
athy to my mother’s, my parents’, my brothers’

  lack of sympathy, so Roithamer. The Cone cost more to build than any other edifice in Austria, as I hear, I’ve obtained the figures on it, so Roithamer.

  Total isolation in Cambridge alternated with total isolation in the Kobernausser forest, where I fixed up a room for myself in the builder’s work hut, for the times when it’s impossible for me to stay in Hoeller’s garret, because I have to be at the building site (March 7), so Roithamer. The secrecy with which I pursued building the Cone in Cambridge, the same secrecy in Altensam, the same secrecy at the Hoeller house, so Roithamer.

  But at night I worked on genetic mutations, in the builder’s hut as well as in Hoeller’s garret, even though I was wholly occupied with the Cone, so Roithamer, there was no outward indication by which an onlooker could have recognized that I was working on genetic mutations while overseeing the building of the Cone in the Kobernausser forest, and on the Cone in Cambridge, while I was teaching and studying, so Roithamer. Every day one idea connected neither with building the Cone nor with my natural science, so Roithamer. The highest demands made of the one discipline applied to the other discipline, so Roithamer. To build, and realize, and complete such an edifice means always to hear and see everything connected with the edifice, meaning of course to hear and see everything and to act on one’s experience of all this hearing and seeing, so Roithamer. What if I’d suddenly informed my sister about my building the Cone? which I didn’t do, so saving myself and my plan. We keep silent about what we know, and make good progress, so Roithamer. At night he’d always heard the woodworm in Altensam, the voracity of the woodworms would keep him awake all night, everywhere and naturally most of all at night, because of his keen hearing and that oversensitive head of his, he heard the woodworm, the deathwatch beetle, at work, in the floor planks and under the floor planks, in the wardrobes and chests, in all the chest drawers most of all, so Roithamer, in the doors and in the window frames, even in the clocks and the chairs and overstuffed armchairs, he’d always been able to distinguish exactly where and in which object, which piece of furniture, a woodworm was at work, the woodworm had actually already gnawed its way into his own bed, while lying awake in bed all night long, so Roithamer, he’d watched the woodworm’s progress, had to watch it, with most concentrated attention, he’d breathed in the sweetish smell of the fresh wood meal and felt depressed at the thought that through all the years thousands, possibly tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of woodworms had infiltrated into Altensam in order to devour Altensam, to keep gnawing away at Altensam and devouring it until it collapsed in one moment, a moment that would quite possibly not be too long in coming. There wasn’t a single object in Altensam, so Roithamer, with out the woodworm in it, and even if it happened to be a new object, something recently acquired, the woodworm would have invaded this new object in no time at all, so Roithamer. When I take a piece of underwear out of a drawer, so Roithamer, I have to shake it out, because it’s full of wood meal, overnight my fresh laundry is full of wood meal, so Roithamer, when I take a handkerchief out of the drawer, I have to blow the wood meal off of it, even the dishes in daily use have to be blown and wiped off, so Roithamer, because they’re covered with wood meal, and actually everybody in Altensam is always full of wood meal, their faces are covered with wood meal, their heads and bodies covered with wood meal, so Roithamer. They were all constantly afraid they might break through the floor planks, because the floor planks were already ominously giving way here and there, because Altensam was constantly changing under the influence of the woodworm’s work (and the dry rot, of course!) they lived in chronic anxiety, because in fact the most noticeable and frightening manifestation in Altensam has been the work of the woodworms, so Roithamer. At first everything was tried against the woodworms, but in the end we had to admit that nothing can be done against woodworms, and we stopped trying. All our lives long in Altensam we were confronted with millions of woodworms, without a chance of defending ourselves against these millions of woodworms. Helpless against the woodworms, so my mother, so Roithamer, we fought the woodworms all our lives, but had to give up the struggle in the end, so my mother, so Roithamer. Each generation in turn, so Roithamer, had pitted itself against the woodworm in Altensam, each feared it would be the one over whose heads Altensam would suddenly collapse, because Altensam is totally riddled by the woodworm, so Roithamer. Once my father sent for a so-called pest control man from Linz, who came up to Altensam and spent weeks there, in vain of course, so Roithamer. And so everyone in Altensam had become accustomed to walking around there in an oddly circumspect manner, because of the woodworms and their centuries-long work of undermining Altensam to the point of having almost worked their way through all of it, everyone adapted his walk most carefully to the floor planks and the wooden ceilings, with an eye to the furniture as well, such an oddly careful manner of walking, simply being considerate of Altensam, and when we had a general conversation, so Roithamer, which happened at most once a year in all these years, then it was the woodworm we talked about. No matter how quiet it is in Altensam, so quiet at times that not a sound seems to be heard, one nevertheless hears the woodworm at Altensam, so Roithamer. The wardrobes, the tables, all stand at a slant, the chests of drawers, the chairs, so Roithamer, the floors are subsiding, the windows no longer fit into their framework, so Roithamer, the struggle against the woodworm had been totally given up (March 9), so Roithamer. Suddenly, after weeks of concentrated mental work, so Roithamer, I went to Marks & Spencer to buy a pullover because my old one, which I’ve worn incessantly all year long, suddenly looked too shabby to me. Walking down Oxford Street to Marks & Spencer I felt supremely happy, so Roithamer, and back to my room with the new pullover (March 11). He locks himself into his room and tries to start his work on the allopolyploids, an inescapable task, already far advanced, so Roithamer, so that he couldn’t shake off his obsession with this task, but after he had made all his preparations for this work, checked the window, checked the door, so Roithamer, checked his chair as well as t e door, all these important steps prior to beginning his work taken and checked out, including checking out the precisely geometric arrangement of all objects he had personally placed on his table and around his table, in his working area, ever, thing had its place and the slightest deviation would have made it impossible for him to begin his work, so Roithamer,. he always had to spend a not inconsiderable amount of time putting all these objects into the position favorable to the starting off of his work process, his own person being also subjected to this drive for order, this absolute discipline of order, physical condition, clothing, everything; for instance, the top shirt-buttons had to be undone, sleeves rolled up andsoforth, so Roithamer, “rolled up” underlined, but first and foremost, the door to his workroom must be locked, the key turned twice in the lock, this dual turning of the key always was of the utmost importance, for the mere chance of someone suddenly opening the door and walking in, someone who was bound to disturb him, whoever it was, this was totally incapacitating, so it often happened that he’d already begun on his work, he’d be all set mentally and had sat down at his worktable, but had forgotten to lock the door, so he had to jump up again and lock the door, but by then it was too late, this short interruption, when he’d already sat down at the table, jumping up, that is, in order to lock the door, was all it took to make further work impossible for him, or else something was wrong with the curtains and he’d have to jump up and put whatever it was with the curtains in order, or some noise made him jump up and forced him to look out the window, or else it was something fallen to the floor, a piece of paper or a crumb of food or a thread or even a dead fly he’d overlooked and which suddenly constituted an unbearable irritation, in total contrast to Hoeller’s garret, so Roithamer, where everything was always simply ideal for him, but if he worked anywhere else, as for instance in his room in Cambridge, under the circumstances sketched above, circumstances which were always invariably awful, time-cons
uming and nerve-wracking, he was always wishing only that he might be in Hoeller’s garret instead, whenever he couldn’t be there, so Roithamer, even if he was disturbed only by the sudden thought of such a possible form of disorder. It wasn’t the actual object itself, all it took was the thought of such an object possibly lying about in disorder, so Roithamer, to make him rise from his desk at once, to find out for certain, whether his supposition was correct andsoforth, so Roithamer, he might happen to be deeply absorbed in his work and the work might be going rather well and then suddenly he’d discover something out of order in his surroundings, even if it were only a shadow cast by an object which was itself in order, but was brought into disorder by its shadow, the kind of shadow that might be cast on the windowsill or the floor or even on the desk as a worktable, so Roithamer, which suddenly disturbs everything to the point of destroying everything, and he’d have to get up from his desk and first straighten out this particular object, because he couldn’t stand the disorder, at the very least he had to see what exactly the disturbing element was, so he actually found it impossible, most of the time, to work (in Cambridge), only every third or fourth day, because there was always some obstacle or other, or else because, after he’d begun to work and had possibly become deeply immersed in work, possibly very deeply immersed, suddenly some irritant presented itself, an irritating sound or an irritating object, which he possibly hadn’t seen or hadn’t heard before he began his work, he often had to get up or jump up only because a book on his desk was not positioned at the correct right angle, or because a so-called bookmark in a book or pamphlet suddenly annoyed him, one of the many hundreds of bits of paper he tore off the daily newspaper to use as bookmarks, which he used to mark his page in all the books and periodicals lying around all over the place, for when such strips of newsprint used as bookmarks stick out of the books beyond the bearable length of six or seven or eight centimeters, when he’d suddenly noticed it and couldn’t stand it, or else he’d noticed a fingerprint that had escaped him up to that point, the kind of fingerprints on the books and papers, on his desk or even on the door, on the window frames andsoforth, so Roithamer, which other people naturally don’t notice, can’t notice, or suppose it’s a whole handprint, so Roithamer, “whole handprint” underlined, even if he only imagined that there might be such a fingerprint or a whole handprint on the door, he had to jump up and check the door or the windows, and once he was disturbed in his work, no matter how deeply he had already immersed himself in it, at first not to a degree that would interfere with his work, but then suddenly he did turn out to be most ruthlessly disturbed, from an observer’s point of view, in his work to a degree that indeed interfered and in fact brought his work to a sudden stop, he’d have to break off his work because he suspected there was a fingerprint (his own or that of another person) on the door or the window frame andsoforth, and he’d get up and rush to the door, “rush” underlined, and examine it, and actually he’d always find what he’d suspected would be there, even if it was the most senseless suspicion, he’d find it confirmed, everything suspected always turned out to be a fact, if for instance he suspected that something wasn’t quite in order under his desk, though he couldn’t see it, since the tabletop naturally prevented him from seeing beneath it, and if he proceeded to act on his suspicion without regard to the disturbing effect such an interruption would have on the work he had just begun, if his suspicion turned out to be founded in fact, he’d break off his work, crawl under the table, find the disorderly or disturbing object andsoforth, so Roithamer, he always found something wrong, something disturbing, once he crawled under the table, such a suspicion had never turned out to be unwarranted, so Roithamer, anyway he found it and straightened it out, though it jeopardized his work, the concentration required for his brain work which he had started but had to break off because of the disorder, but he had to straighten out the disorder under his desk or on the window or wherever it might occur in his study, and I tried, so Roithamer, after once more making sure that I really was locked into my room, by turning the key twice in the lock, so Roithamer, I was in control, and having taken control I felt reassured that I was indeed locked into my room, and I tried to make some progress in my work on the allopolyploids (March 17), so Roithamer, “tried” underlined. I recall a little essay on the thorn apple, the so-called datura stramonium, that he did after his sister’s death, on coming back from Altensam to Cambridge, to regain his peace of mind, while I went to the Tate Gallery, so Roithamer, alone, because I always had to visit this museum alone, it’s my favorite museum, the only museum in the world which I not only could endure but could actually love, during this visit to the Tate, so Roithamer, I was able to gain a little peace of mind by working on the thorn apple, the so-called datura stramonium, because I was working most intently, while at the Tate Gallery, on this little paper which I believe turned out rather well, I was working on William Blake for one thing, and for the other on the thorn apple, it was good for me in the condition in which I was left by the death of my sister, in that mentally dull, mind-disturbing and mind- de stroying condition, so Roithamer, which suddenly inspired me to write something about the thorn apple, for my own distraction, to distract my head from the death of my sister, so Roithamer.