by Günter Grass
The greengrocer Greff and Jan Bronski, who was weeping in a high-pitched feminine register, led my grandmother away from the coffin. The men could now fasten the lid and assume at last the faces pallbearers always assume when they take up their positions beneath the coffin. At the semirural cemetery at Brentau, with its two fields on either side of the avenue lined with elms, with its little chapel that looked like a pasteboard set for a Nativity play, with its draw-well, with its quick and lively bird world, on the neatly raked cemetery lane, right behind Matzerath at the head of the procession, I took pleasure for the first time in the coffin's shape. Since then I've often had occasion to let my gaze glide over the black or dark brown wood employed for ultimate ends. My poor mama's coffin was black. It tapered in a wonderfully harmonious way toward the foot. Is there any other shape in the world so admirably suited to the human form?
If only beds narrowed like that toward the foot. If only all our familiar and occasional couches tapered so clearly toward the foot. For we can strut about all we like; in the end, the broad expanse of the head, shoulders, and torso always tapers down to the narrow base of our feet.
Matzerath walked directly behind the coffin. He carried his top hat in his hand and did his best, in spite of his sorrow, to hold himself erect during the slow march. Whenever I looked at his neck I felt sorry for him: the bulge at the back of his head and those two rigid tendons that climbed from collar to hairline.
Why was it Mother Truczinski who took my hand and not Gretchen Schemer or Hedwig Bronski? She lived on the second floor of our building, apparently had no first name; everyone called her Mother Truczinski.
Ahead of the coffin, Father Wiehnke with acolytes and incense. My gaze slipped from Matzerath's neck to the crisscrossed furrows of the pallbearers' necks. Oskar had to fight a wild desire: to climb up on the coffin. To sit right on top and drum. To drum with his sticks on the lid of that coffin and not on his drum. To ride on the top as they carried it swaying. While the Right Reverend followed in prayer from behind, Oskar would lead by drumming in front. As the coffin was placed over pit, planks, and ropes, he would keep calmly poised on the wood. Midst sermon, incense, holy water, and bells he'd drum out the Latin on top of the wood and stay as they lowered both him and the box by the ropes. Would descend to the grave with Mama and fetus. Would stay down below while those left behind cast handfuls of earth, and not come back up, but sit on the tapered foot drumming, even under the earth if he could, just keep right on drumming, till the sticks in his hands, the wood of his sticks, till his Mama for him, till he for her, till each for the other, had rotted away, given their flesh to the earth and its tenants; and Oskar would gladly have played something more with his little knuckles for the tender cartilage of the fetus, had that only been possible and permitted.
No one sat on the coffin. It swayed bare beneath the elms and weeping willows of Brentau Cemetery. Among the graves, the sexton's speckled hens, pecking for worms, reaping though they had not sown. Then through the birches. I behind Matzerath, holding Mother Truczinski's hand, Grandmother right behind me—Greff and Jan escorting her—Vinzent Bronski on Hedwig's arm, little Marga and Stephan hand in hand ahead of the Schefflers. Laubschad the clockmaker, old Herr Heilandt, Meyn the trumpeter, but without his instrument and relatively sober.
Not till it was all over and people began offering their condolences did I notice Sigismund Markus. Dressed in black and embarrassed, he joined those who wanted to shake hands with Matzerath, me, my grandmother, and the Bronskis, and murmur something. At first I didn't understand what Alexander Schemer wanted of Markus. They hardly knew each other, perhaps they'd never even met. Finally Meyn the musician joined in and said something to the toy merchant. They stood behind a waist-high hedge of the sort of greenery that leaves a stain and tastes bitter when you rub it between your fingers. Frau Kater with her daughter Susi, who had grown somewhat too quickly and was grinning behind her handkerchief, were expressing their condolences to Matzerath and didn't miss the chance to pat me on the head. The altercation behind the hedge grew louder but remained indistinct. The trumpeter Meyn poked Markus on his black suit with his index finger, pushed him backward, then took Sigismund's left arm while Schemer linked arms on the right. Both were careful to see that Markus, who was stepping backward, didn't stumble over the borders of the graves, pushed him onto the main path, and showed Sigismund the way to the cemetery gate. He appeared to thank them for the information, walked away toward the exit, putting on his top hat as he did so, and did not look back, as Meyn and the baker watched him.
Neither Matzerath nor Mother Truczinski noticed that I had evaded them and the condolences. Acting like a little boy who has to go, Oskar sneaked off past the gravedigger and his helper, then ran, with no regard for the ivy, and reached both the elms and Sigismund Markus at the exit.
"Little Oskar!" Markus said in surprise. "Why are they treating Markus like this? What's he done to deserve it?"
I didn't know what Markus had done, took him by his hand, clammy with sweat, led him through the wrought-iron cemetery gate, which stood open, and the two of us, the keeper of my drums and I, the drummer, possibly his drummer, ran into Crazy Leo, who shared our belief in paradise.
Markus knew Leo, for Leo was well-known around town. I had heard of Crazy Leo, knew that one sunny day, while he was still at the seminary, the world, the sacraments, the confessions, heaven and hell, life and death, had driven him so mad that from then on Leo's world-view, though mad, was radiant with perfection.
Crazy Leo's occupation was to turn up after every funeral—and no one took leave without his knowledge—wearing white gloves and a shiny black suit several sizes too big for him, to await the mourners. Markus and I both understood that he was standing there at the wrought-iron gate of Brentau Cemetery in a professional capacity, his glove oozing sympathy, his watery eyes crazed, his drooling mouth drooling toward the mourners.
Mid-May: A bright, sunny day. Hedges and trees filled with birds. Cackling hens, symbolizing immortality by and through their eggs. Humming in the air. A fresh coat of green without dust. Crazy Leo carried his faded silk hat in his gloved left hand, approached lightly, like a dancer, for he was truly touched by grace, with five mildewed glove fingers thrust forth toward Markus and me, then stood before us, leaning to one side as if in a wind, though not the slightest breeze stirred, tilted his head and babbled, dribbling threads, as Markus, hesitantly at first and then firmly, placed his bare hand in the clutching glove: "What a beautiful day. Now she's where everything's cheap. Did you see the Lord? Habemus ad Dominum. He passed by in a hurry. Amen"
We said amen, and Markus assured Leo the day was beautiful, even said he'd seen the Lord.
Behind us we heard the approaching hum of the mourners from the cemetery. Markus let his hand fall from Leo's glove, still found time for a tip, gave me a Markus look, and scurried off to the taxi waiting for him outside the Brentau post office.
I was still watching the cloud of dust that cloaked a disappearing Markus when Mother Truczinski took me by the hand again. They arrived in larger and smaller groups. Crazy Leo offered his condolences to all, called their attention to the beautiful day, asked them if they had seen the Lord, and received, as usual, larger or smaller tips, or none at all. Matzerath and Jan Bronski paid the pallbearers, the gravedigger, the sexton, and Father Wiehnke, who with an embarrassed sigh allowed Crazy Leo to kiss his hand, and with kissed hand sent gestures of blessing after the slowly dispersing crowd of mourners.
Meanwhile we—my grandmother, her brother Vinzent, the Bronskis with their children, Greff without his wife, and Gretchen Scheffler—seated ourselves in two one-horse box carts. We were taken past Goldkrug through the forest and across the nearby Polish border to Bissau-Abbau for the funeral banquet.
Vinzent Bronski's farmyard lay in a hollow. Poplars stood before it to ward off lightning. They took the barn door off its hinges, laid it across wooden trestles, and spread tablecloths over it. More people came from t
he surrounding area. The meal lasted a long time. We banqueted in the entrance to the barn. Gretchen Schemer held me on her lap. The food was greasy, then sweet, then greasy again, potato schnapps, beer, a goose and a piglet, cake and sausage side by side, pumpkin in vinegar and sugar, red fruit jelly with sour cream, toward evening a breeze through the open barn, mice rustled, as did the Bronski children, who in league with the neighborhood brats took over the farmyard.
With the oil lamps the skat cards appeared on the table. The potato schnapps stayed. There was also eggnog, homemade. That cheered things up. And Greff, who didn't drink, sang songs. The Kashubes sang too, and Matzerath dealt first. Jan was second and the foreman from the brickworks third. Only then did I truly realize poor Mama was gone. They played well into the night, but none of the men could win a heart hand. When Jan Bronski inexplicably lost a heart hand without four, I heard him say to Matzerath in a low voice, "Agnes would have won that for sure."
With that I slipped from Gretchen Schemer's lap and found my grandmother and her brother Vinzent outside. They were sitting on a wagon shaft. Vinzent was muttering to the stars in Polish. My grandmother could cry no more but let me under her skirts.
Who will take me under her skirts today? Who will switch off the daylight and lamplight for me? Who will give me the smell of that yellow, slightly rancid melted butter that my grandmother stockpiled, sheltered, and seasoned as fare for me under her skirts and gave me once upon a time, a fare I liked, and came to long for.
I fell asleep beneath her four skirts, close to my poor mama's beginnings, and found a peace almost as still, if not as breathless, as she found in that box which tapered toward the foot.
Herbert Truczinski's Back
Nothing can take a mother's place, they say. Soon after Mama's burial I began to miss my poor mama. The Thursday visits to Sigismund Markus stopped, I was no longer taken to Sister Inge's white uniform, and Saturdays in particular brought home my mama's death with painful clarity: Mama no longer went to confession.
So I was cut off from the Altstadt, the office of Dr. Hollatz, the Church of the Sacred Heart. I'd lost all interest in rallies. And how was I supposed to lure passersby to shop windows when even the tempter's trade now seemed bland and insipid to Oskar? There was no more Mama to take me to the Stadt-Theater for the Christmas play, or to the Krone or Busch circus. Conscientiously if somewhat morosely, I pursued my studies on my own, tediously tracing the rectilinear streets of the suburb toward Kleinhammerweg to visit Gretchen Scheffler, who told me of Strength through Joy trips to the Land of the Midnight Sun, while I kept on comparing Goethe with Rasputin, never coming to the end of such comparisons, escaping that constant cycle of radiance and darkness most often through historical studies. A Struggle for Rome, Keyser's History of the City of Danzig, and Köhler's Naval Calendar, my old standard works, gave me a worldwide half knowledge. To this very day I can give you precise details on the armor, firepower, launching, manufacture, and crew strength of every ship that participated, sank, or was damaged in the Battle of Skagerrak.
I was almost fourteen, loved solitude, and often went on walks. My drum came along, but I plied its tin sparingly, for Mama's departure called into question the timely delivery of drums both then and in the future.
Was it in the fall of thirty-seven or the spring of thirty-eight? At any rate I was tripping along Hindenburgallee toward the city, had just about reached the Café Vierjahreszeiten, leaves were falling, or buds were bursting, at any rate Nature was up to something, when I ran into my friend Master Bebra, who was a direct descendant of Prince Eugen and consequently of Louis the Fourteenth.
We hadn't seen one another in three years, and yet we recognized each other at twenty paces. He was not alone; on his arm hung a dainty southern beauty almost an inch shorter than Bebra, three finger-breadths taller than me, whom he presented in the course of the introductions as Roswitha Raguna, Italy's most famous somnambulist.
Bebra invited me for a cup of Mocha at the Café Vierjahreszeiten. We sat in the Aquarium Room, and the coffee-drinking biddies hissed, "Look at the midgets, Lisbeth, did you see? Do you think they're at Krone's circus? We ought to try and go."
Bebra smiled at me and showed a thousand barely visible tiny wrinkles.
The waiter who brought our Mocha was very tall. As Frau Roswitha ordered a small tart she gazed up at the towering man in tails.
Bebra looked me over: "He doesn't seem to be doing so well, our glass slayer. What's wrong, my friend? Is the glass unwilling, or is the voice a little too weak?"
Young and impetuous as I was, Oskar wanted to give a little sample of his still vibrant art then and there. I looked about me and focused on the large glass surface of the aquarium with its ornamental fish and aquatic plants, but Bebra spoke up before I could break out in song: "Hold on, my friend! We believe you. Let's not destroy anything, please, no floods, no dying fish."
Shamefaced, I apologized, particularly to Signora Roswitha, who had pulled out a miniature fan and was agitatedly stirring up a breeze.
"My mama died," I tried to explain. "She shouldn't have done that. I'm very upset with her. People always say that a mother sees all, feels all, forgives all. Mother's Day clichés. She saw me as a midget. She would have done away with me if she could. But she couldn't do away with me, since children, even midgets, are recorded and you can't just get rid of them. Then too, I was her midget, if she'd done away with me she would have done away with herself, and that would have stopped her. It's either me or the midget, she said to herself, then ended it all, ate nothing but fish, not even fresh fish, took leave of her lovers, and now that she's lying in Brentau they all say, all the lovers, all the customers at the store: The midget drummed her to her grave. She didn't want to go on living because of little Oskar, he killed her!"
I was exaggerating wildly, perhaps in hopes of impressing Signora Roswitha. After all, most people blamed Matzerath, and especially Jan Bronski, for Mama's death. Bebra saw right through me.
"You're exaggerating, my good friend. You're upset with your dead mama out of pure jealousy. You feel slighted because it wasn't you but those tiresome lovers who sent her to her grave. You're wicked and vain, as befits a genius."
Then, after a sigh and a sidelong glance at Signora Roswitha: "It's not easy to persevere in life when you're our size. To remain human without growing visibly, what a task, what a calling!"
Roswitha Raguna, the Neapolitan somnambulist with the smooth yet wrinkled skin, whose age I put at eighteen springtides and in the next breath admired as an old woman of eighty or perhaps ninety years, Signora Roswitha stroked Herr Bebra's elegant tailored suit, cut in the English style, then projected her cherry-black Mediterranean eyes at me, while her dark voice filled with the promise of fruit moved me, yet chilled me too: "Carissimo, Oskarnello! How I understand that pain! Andiamo, come with us: Milano, Parigi, Toledo, Guatemala!"
My head began to reel. I seized Raguna's ancient, childlike hand. The Mediterranean beat against my coast, olive trees whispered in my ear: "Roswitha will be your mama, Roswitha will understand. She, the great somnambulist, who sees through everyone, knows everyone, except herself, mammamia, except herself. Dio!"
Oddly enough, Raguna had barely begun to see through me and illuminate me with her somnambulistic gaze when she jerked her hand back in fright. Had my hungry fourteen-year-old heart terrified her? Had she grasped that Roswitha was still Roswitha to me, be she girl or old woman? She whispered in Neapolitan, trembled, crossed herself so often it seemed the terrors she read in me were endless, then disappeared without a word behind her fan.
Confused, I sought an explanation, asked to have a word with Bebra. But even Bebra, in spite of his direct descent from Prince Eugen, had lost his composure, stammered, till I finally understood: "Your genius, my young friend, the divine but certainly devilish nature of your genius, has confused my good Roswitha somewhat, and I too must confess that a certain wild abandon that erupts in you is foreign to me, though not entirely
incomprehensible. But"—Bebra gathered himself—"regardless of the nature of your character, come with us, perform in Bebra's Miracle Show. With a little self-discipline and moderation you should be able to find an audience, even in the present political circumstances."
I understood at once. Bebra, who'd advised me always to be on the grandstands, not standing in front of them, had taken his place among the rank and file, even if he continued to perform in the circus. So he wasn't at all disappointed when I declined his offer with polite regret. And the Signora released an audible sigh of relief behind her fan and showed me her Mediterranean eyes once more.
We chatted for another hour or so, I asked the waiter to bring me an empty glass, sang a heart-shaped opening into it, sang a curving inscription with flourishes beneath, From Oskar to Roswitha, gave her the glass, which pleased her, Bebra paid, and added a large tip before we left.
They both accompanied me to the Sporthalle. I pointed with my drumstick toward the naked grandstand at the other end of the Maiwiese and—now I remember, it was in the spring of thirty-eight—told Master Bebra about my career as a drummer under grandstands.
Bebra gave an embarrassed smile, Raguna's face was stern. And while the Signora stood a few paces off to the side, Bebra whispered in my ear as he took his leave: "I've failed, my friend, how could I be your teacher now? Oh, the dirty politics."
Then he kissed me on the forehead, as he had years ago when I met him among the circus wagons, Lady Roswitha held out a hand like porcelain, and I bent politely, almost too smoothly for a fourteen-year-old, over the fingers of the somnambulist.
"We'll meet again, my son!" Herr Bebra winked. "Regardless of the times, people like us don't lose each other."
"Forgive your fathers!" the Signora admonished me. "Accustom yourself to your own existence, so that your heart may be at peace and Satan discomforted!"
I felt as if the Signora had baptized me a second time, but once again in vain. Satan, depart—but Satan did not depart. I looked after them sadly and with an empty heart, waved as they entered a taxi and disappeared within, for the Ford was built for grownups and looked empty, as if cruising for customers, as it roared away with my friends.