by Günter Grass
The resulting short circuit, blackout, flying sparks, and forest fire, which provoked a panic, though they finally got it under control, were consequences I hadn't counted on, for I lost more among the crowd than just Mama and her two rudely awakened men; my drum also vanished in the confusion.
This third encounter of mine with the theater gave Mama, who began, after that evening at the Opera-in-the-Woods, to domesticate Wag ner in simplified arrangements on our piano, the idea of introducing me to the world of the circus in the spring of thirty-four.
Oskar has no intention of going on here about silvery ladies on the trapeze, tigers from Busch's circus, or trained seals. No one fell from the top of the circus tent. Nothing was bitten off any animal tamer. And the seals did what they'd been trained to do: they juggled balls and were tossed live herring by way of reward. I am indebted to the circus for providing entertaining children's matinees and my highly significant encounter with Bebra the musical clown, who played "Jimmy the Tiger" on bottles and directed a troupe of midgets.
We met in the menagerie. Mama and her two men were allowing themselves to be insulted at the monkey cage. Hedwig Bronski, who for once was part of the group, was showing her children the ponies. After a lion had yawned at me, I was foolish enough to get involved with an owl. I tried to stare the bird down, but it stared me down instead; and Oskar slunk away stunned, with burning ears, wounded to the core, and slipped off among the blue and white wagons, because, except for a few tethered dwarf goats, there were no animals there.
He walked past me in suspenders and slippers, carrying a pail of water. Glances crossed but fleetingly. Yet we knew each other at once. He set the pail down, tilted his great head to one side, came up to me, and I guessed that he was about four inches taller than me.
"Look at this!" came an envious growl. "These days three-year-olds don't want to grow anymore." Since I said nothing, he came at me again: "Bebra's my name, direct descendant of Prince Eugen, whose father was Louis the Fourteenth and not any old Savoyard, as they claim." I still said nothing, so he took a new run at it: "I stopped growing on my tenth birthday. A little late, but even so!"
Since he spoke so openly, I too introduced myself, but without concocting some family tree, just said I was Oskar. "Tell me, my dear Oskar, you could be fourteen now, even fifteen or sixteen. It's not possible; nine and a half, you say?"
Now I was supposed to guess his age, and made it deliberately low.
"You flatter me, my young friend. Thirty-five, that was once upon a time. In August I celebrate my fifty-third, I could be your grandfather!"
Oskar said a few nice things to him about his acrobatic clown act, praised his musical talents, and, seized by a touch of ambition, per formed a little trick for him. Three light bulbs illuminating the circus grounds were taken in by it, and Herr Bebra called out bravo, bravissimo, and wanted to hire Oskar on the spot.
I still occasionally regret that I declined. I talked myself out of it, saying, "You know, Herr Bebra, I prefer to be part of the audience, to allow my little art to bloom in secret, far from all applause, but I would be the last person to fail to applaud your performances." Herr Bebra raised his crumpled forefinger and admonished me: "My dear Oskar, take it from an experienced colleague. The likes of us should never be part of the audience. We have to be on the stage, in the arena. We have to perform and direct the action, otherwise our kind will be manipulated by those who do. And they'll all too happily pull a fast one on us."
His eyes turning ancient, and almost crawling into my ear, he whispered, "They're coming! They will take over the festival grounds. They will stage torchlight parades. They will build grandstands, they will fill grandstands, they will preach our destruction from grandstands. Watch closely, my young friend, what happens on those grandstands. Always try to be sitting on the grandstands, and never standing in front of them."
Then, since my name was being called, Herr Bebra reached for his pail. "They're looking for you, my young friend. We'll see each other again. We're too little to lose each other. Bebra always says: Little people like us can squeeze into even the most crowded grandstands. And if not on the grandstand, then under the grandstand, but never in front. So says Bebra, direct descendant of Prince Eugen."
Mama, who stepped from behind a circus wagon calling for Oskar, was just in time to see Bebra kiss me on the forehead, then pick up his pail of water, and rowing with his shoulders, steer his way toward another wagon.
"Just imagine," Mama later reported indignantly to Matzerath and the Bronskis, "he was with the midgets. A dwarf kissed him on the forehead. I hope that doesn't mean anything."
Bebra's kiss on my forehead was to mean a great deal indeed to me. The political events of the following years proved him right: the era of torchlight parades and grandstand assemblies began.
Just as I followed Herr Bebra's advice, Mama took to heart one of the warnings Sigismund Markus gave her in the Arsenal Arcade and contin ued to repeat every Thursday. Even though she didn't go to London with Markus—I would have had no particular objection to such a move—she stayed with Matzerath, seeing Jan Bronski only discreetly and occasionally, that is, on Tischlergasse at Jan's expense, and during family skat games, which became more and more expensive for Jan, since he always lost. Meanwhile, following Markus's advice, Mama let her stakes lie, though without doubling them, and placed her bet on Matzerath, who recognized the forces of law and order relatively early on and joined the Party in thirty-four, yet even so never advanced beyond cell leader. On the occasion of this promotion, which, like any unusual event, called for a family game of skat, Matzerath introduced a new note of severity, as well as concern, to the warnings he was constantly giving Jan Bronski about his service as an official in the Polish Post Office.
Otherwise things didn't change much. The grim portrait of Beethoven hanging over the piano, a gift from Greff, was removed from its nail, and an equally grim portrait of Hitler was hung on the same nail. Matzerath, who had no interest in serious music, wanted to banish the nearly deaf composer completely. But Mama, who loved the slow movements of Beethoven sonatas, had learned to play two or three of them at a slower tempo than indicated, and occasionally let them flow slowly forth on the piano, insisted that Beethoven be placed, if not over the sofa, at least over the sideboard. This resulted in the grimmest of confrontations: Hitler and the genius hung opposite each other, stared at each other, saw through each other, yet found no joy in what they saw.
Little by little Matzerath pieced together his uniform. If I remember correctly, he began with the Party cap, which he enjoyed wearing, even in sunny weather, with the storm strap chafing his chin. For a time he donned a white shirt and black tie with this cap, or a windbreaker with an armband. When he bought his first brown shirt, he wanted to buy the shit-brown riding breeches and high boots a week later. Mama objected, and it was several weeks before Matzerath was finally in his full getup.
There were several occasions each week when he could wear this uniform, but Matzerath contented himself with joining the Sunday rallies on the Maiwiese by the Sporthalle. These, however, he never missed, appearing doggedly in even the worst weather, refusing to carry an umbrella when in uniform, and repeating time and again what was soon to become a stock phrase. "Duty is duty," Matzerath would say, "and schnapps is schnapps"; then, having prepared the noon roast in advance, he would say goodbye to Mama on Sunday mornings, and leave me in an embarrassing position, for Jan Bronski, who was well aware of the new political situation on Sundays, called on my abandoned mama in his straightforward civilian way while Matzerath was standing among the rank and file.
What could I do but keep out of the way? I had no intention of disturbing the two of them on the sofa, or watching them. So the moment my uniformed father was out of sight, and prior to the arrival of the civilian I already thought of as my presumptive father, I drummed my way out of the house and headed for the Maiwiese.
You may well ask why of all places it had to be the Maiwiese. Be
lieve me, there was nothing going on at the waterfront on Sundays, I had no intention of hiking through the woods, and the interior of the Church of the Sacred Heart as yet meant nothing to me. True, there were Herr Greff's Boy Scouts, but at the risk of being called a fellow traveler I have to admit I preferred the commotion on the Maiwiese to that repressed eroticism.
Either Greiser or Löbsack, who was District Head of Indoctrination, was speaking. I never took much notice of Greiser. He was too moderate and was later replaced by a bolder man, a Bavarian named Forster, who became Gauleiter. But Löbsack was the sort of man to replace a Forster. Yes, if Löbsack had not had a hump, it would have been hard for the Bavarian from Fürth to find his footing on the cobblestones of our port city. Correctly assessing Löbsack's value, and seeing in his hump a sign of high intelligence, the Party had made him District Head of Indoctrination. The man knew his business. While Forster kept screaming "Home to the Reich" in his ugly Bavarian accent, Löbsack went into more detail, spoke every Low German dialect in Danzig, told jokes about Bollermann and Wullsutzki, knew how to talk to the dockers at Schichau, the common folk in Ohra, the citizens of Emaus, Schidlitz, Bürgerwiesen, and Praust. When it came to dealing with beer-earnest Communists and the feeble catcalls of a few Socialists, it was a joy to listen to the little man, whose hump was greatly enhanced by his brown uniform.
Löbsack had wit, derived all his wit from his hump, made no bones about his hump; the crowd always likes that. He was more likely to lose his hump, Löbsack claimed, than the Communists were to come to power. You could see he wasn't about to lose his hump, there was no shaking that hump, his hump was right, and with it the Party—from which we may deduce that a hump provides the ideal basis for an idea.
When Greiser, Löbsack, or, later on, Forster spoke, they spoke from the grandstand. This was the grandstand that little Herr Bebra had extolled. So for a long time I thought that Löbsack, the grandstand orator, humped and highly gifted as he appeared on the grandstand, was Bebra's brown-clad envoy in disguise, advocating Bebra's cause, and in essence mine as well, from the grandstand.
What is a grandstand? No matter for whom and by whom a grandstand is erected, it must always be symmetrical. So the grandstand on the Maiwiese by the Sporthalle was also strictly symmetrical. From top to bottom: Six swastika banners side by side. Then flags, pennants, and standards. Then a row of black SS with storm straps under their chins. Then two rows of SA, holding their hands on their belt buckles through all the singing and speechifying. Then several rows of seated Party members in uniform, behind the speaker's podium more Party members, maternal-faced leaders from the Women's Association, representatives from the Senate in civilian dress, guests from the Reich, and the Chief of Police or his representative.
The base of the grandstand was rejuvenated by the Hitler Youth, or more precisely by the regional brass band of the Hitler Young Volk and the regional drum and bugle corps of the Hitler Youth. At some rallies mixed choruses, always symmetrically arranged to left and right, were allowed to recite slogans or sing the praises of the ever popular East Wind, which, according to the text, was better suited than any other wind to unfurl flags and banners.
Bebra, who kissed me on the forehead, had added, "Oskar, never stand in front of a grandstand. The likes of us belong on the grandstand!"
Most of the time I managed to find a place among the leaders of the Women's Association. Unfortunately these women wouldn't stop caressing me for propaganda purposes during the rally. I wasn't allowed to join the kettledrums, trumpets, and snare drums at the base of the grandstand, for the lansquenet corps had rejected my tin drum. Nor did my approach to District Indoctrination Head Löbsack go well. The man was a big disappointment. Neither was he Bebra's envoy, as I had hoped, nor had he, in spite of his promising hump, the faintest understanding of my true stature.
When I approached him at the podium one grandstand Sunday, gave him the Party salute, stared at him blankly at first, then whispered to him with a wink, "Bebra is our Führer!" no light went on in Löbsack, but instead he stroked me just as the Nazi women did, then had Oskar escorted off the grandstand—after all, he had a speech to give—between two leaders of the League of German Girls, who quizzed him about "Mommy and Poppy" throughout the rally.
So it will come as no surprise that by the summer of thirty-four, though not influenced by the Röhm putsch, I was becoming disillusioned with the Party. The longer I scrutinized the grandstand from the front, the more suspicious I became of that symmetry which had been but insufficiently relieved by Löbsack's hump. You can well imagine that my criticism was aimed at the drummers and brass players in particular; and on a muggy rally Sunday in August of thirty-five I had it out with the brass band and drum and bugle corps at the base of the grandstand.
Matzerath was out of the apartment by nine. I'd helped him polish his brown leather puttees so he could leave the house on time. Even at that early hour it was unbearably hot, and dark stains were spreading under the arms of his Party shirt before he even got outside. At nine-thirty on the dot Jan Bronski turned up in an airy, light-colored summer suit with perforated, delicate-gray oxfords, wearing a straw hat. Jan played with me for a while, but even as he played he couldn't keep his eyes off Mama, who had washed her hair the night before. I soon realized that my presence was hindering their conversation, making them feel awkward, and limiting Jan's movements. Those lightweight summer trousers were clearly becoming a little too tight for him, so I toddled off, following in Matzerath's footsteps, though I didn't see him as my model. Carefully avoiding streets filled with uniformed men surging toward the Maiwiese, I approached the parade grounds for the first time by way of the tennis courts next to the Sporthalle. Thanks to this detour I had a rear view of the grandstand.
Have you ever seen a grandstand from behind? All men and women—this is merely a suggestion—should familiarize themselves with the rear view of a grandstand before they are gathered in front of one. Any one who has examined a grandstand from behind, and examined it closely, will be marked from that hour, and thus immunized against any and all forms of magic practiced on grandstands. The same can be said for the rear view of church altars; but that's another story.
But Oskar, who has always inclined to thoroughness, was not satisfied with a simple view of the bare scaffolding in all its tangible ugliness, and recalling the words of his mentor Bebra, he approached the grandstand, meant to be seen only from the front, from its crude backside, squeezed himself and his drum, which he never left behind, through the struts, struck his head on an overhead beam, scratched his knee on a nail protruding nastily from a wooden plank, heard the boots of the Party comrades scraping above him, then the little shoes of the Women's Association, and finally reached the most sweltering and hence most representative spot for the month of August: facing the inner side of the base of the grandstand he found sufficient space and shelter behind a sheet of plywood to enjoy to the fullest and in peace the acoustic pleasures of a political rally, without being diverted by flags or visually offended by uniforms.
I crouched beneath the speaker's podium. To my right and left and above me, the younger drummers of the Young Volk and the older ones of the Hitler Youth stood spread-legged and squinting against the blinding sunlight. And then the crowd. I could smell it through the cracks of the grandstand planks. They stood and rubbed elbows in their Sunday best, they arrived on foot or by tram, they came in part from early Mass, still not fully satisfied, they came with fiancée on arm for the show, they wanted to be present when history was made, even if it took all morning.
No, said Oskar to himself, they shall not have come in vain. And placing his eye to a knothole in the planks, he noted a commotion along Hindenburgallee. They were coming! Commands rang out above him, the leader of the drum and bugle corps waggled his baton, they puffed on their trumpets, adjusted the mouthpieces to their lips, and they were off, blowing through their brightly-Sidol-polished instruments in their worst lansquenet style, hurting Oskar's ears.
"Poor SA Man Brand," said he to himself, "poor Hitler Youth Quex, you've died in vain!"
As if to confirm his obituary for the martyrs of the movement, a massive thumping on taut calfskin drumheads now mingled with the trumpetry. The lane that led through the crowd to the grandstand gave a hint of uniforms approaching in the far distance, and Oskar burst out, "Now my people, now my Volk, hearken unto me!"
My drum was already in place. With divine suppleness I let the sticks play in my hands and with delicate wrists I laid a joyful waltz rhythm of consummate artistry upon my drum, sending it forth with increasing insistence, conjuring up Vienna and the Danube, until the first and second lansquenet drums above me found pleasure in my waltz, and the shallow drums of the older boys took up my prelude with greater or lesser skill. Among them were indeed a few diehards who had no ear, who kept boom-boom and boom-boom-booming away, while I was intent on the three-four time so beloved of the Volk. Oskar was almost ready to despair when the trumpet section finally saw the light, and the fifes blew Danube, oh Danube so blue. Only the directors of the brass band and the drum and bugle corps refused to bow to the king of the waltzes and kept shouting their annoying commands, but I had deposed them, the music was now mine. And the Volk thanked me for it. Laughter broke out in front of the grandstand, a few people were already singing along, oh Danube, and all across the grounds, so blue, clear to Hindenburgallee, so blue, to Steffenspark, so blue, my rhythm skipped along, amplified by the open microphone above me. And as I looked through my knothole, drumming away diligently all the while, I saw that the Volk were enjoying my waltz, they were hopping about happily, it was in their legs: nine couples were already dancing, and were soon joined by another, paired by the king of the waltzes. Only Löbsack, who, along with various district leaders and regimental commanders, with Forster, Greiser, and Rauschning and a long brown column of staff, was fuming in the midst of the crowd now blocking his way to the grandstand, seemed surprisingly immune to the rhythm of the waltz. He was accustomed to being channeled to the grandstand with linear marching music. These easygoing tones were undermining his faith in the Volk. I saw his sorrows through the knothole. A draft was coming through the hole. I may have risked an inflammation of the eye, but I still felt sorry for him and switched over to a Charleston, "Jimmy the Tiger," broke into the rhythm Bebra the clown had drummed on empty bottles of seltzer water at the circus; but the boys in front of the grandstand didn't get the Charleston. They belonged to a different genera tion. Of course they knew nothing about the Charleston and "Jimmy the Tiger" What they pounded out—O my good friend Bebra—wasn't "Jimmy the Tiger," they banged out any old thing at all, let Sodom and Gomorrah flourish on their trumpets. Skip, march, or dance, it's all one to us, the fifes must have thought. The angry trumpet leader chewed out every Tom, Heinz, and Harry in turn. Nevertheless the boys of the brass and the drum and bugle corps drummed, blew, and trumpeted like the devil, so that Jimmy was in seventh heaven in that hottest tigery August, till those thousands and thousands of simple Volk jostling about in front of the grandstand understood at last: Jimmy the Tiger is asking the Volk to Charleston!