by Günter Grass
Once upon a time there was a clockmaker named Laubschad, and he lived on the first floor of our building in a two-room flat with windows overlooking the courtyard. Laubschad the clockmaker was unmarried, a member of the National Socialist Welfare Organization and the SPCA. Laubschad had a good heart and helped all tired humans, sick animals, and broken clocks back on their feet. As the clockmaker sat musing at the window one afternoon, thinking back on a neighbor's funeral he'd attended that morning, he saw Meyn the musician, who lived on the fourth floor of the same building, lowering a half-full potato sack that seemed to be wet on the bottom and dripping, into one of the two garbage cans. But since the garbage can was three-fourths full, the musician had a hard time getting the lid back on.
Once upon a time there were four tomcats, one of them named Bismarck. These tomcats belonged to a musician named Meyn. Since the tomcats hadn't been fixed they had a strong and pungent smell, and one day, when for personal reasons he found the smell particularly annoying, the musician slew the four cats with a poker, put the cadavers in a potato sack, carried the sack down the four flights of stairs, and quickly deposited the bundle in a courtyard garbage can by the carpet rack, because the sack was leaky and already dripping by the time he reached the second floor. But since the can was fairly full, the musician had to compress the garbage along with the sack in order to put on the lid. No sooner had he exited onto the street from the building—for he had no desire to go back to a catless flat that still smelled of cats—than the compressed garbage began to expand, lifting the sack and with it the lid.
Once upon a time there was a musician who slew his four cats, stuffed them in a garbage can, left the building, and went to visit friends.
Once upon a time there was a clockmaker who sat lost in thought at his window and observed how Meyn the musician stuffed a half-full sack in the garbage can, then left the courtyard, and how, a few moments after Meyn's departure, the lid of the garbage can began to rise and kept on rising.
Once upon a time there were four cats who, because they smelled more strongly than usual on a particular day, were killed, stuffed in a sack, and buried in a garbage can. But the cats, one of them named Bismarck, weren't dead yet, being tough, like most cats. They shifted about in the sack, set the garbage-can lid in motion, and confronted Laubschad the clockmaker, who still sat pensively at his window, with a question: Guess what's in the sack that Meyn the musician stuffed in the garbage can?
Once upon a time there was a clockmaker who couldn't look on quietly while something was stirring in the garbage can. So he left his flat on the first floor of the building, went into the courtyard, removed the lid from the garbage can, opened the sack, and took the four battered but still living cats to his flat to care for them. But they died the following night under the clockmaker's hands, which left him no recourse but to lodge a complaint with the SPCA, of which he was a member, and inform local Party headquarters of a case of cruelty to animals which might damage the Party's reputation.
Once upon a time there was an SA man who killed four cats, was betrayed by them, since they weren't quite dead, and was informed against by a clockmaker. This resulted in judicial proceedings, and the SA man had to pay a fine. The case was discussed in the SA as well, and the SA man was expelled from the SA for dishonorable conduct. Even the conspicuous bravery he demonstrated during the night of the ninth to the tenth of November thirty-eight, which later came to be known as Kristallnacht, when he joined others in torching the Langfuhr Synagogue on Michaelisweg, and his active participation the following morning in emptying several shops that had been carefully marked in advance, all his zeal could not prevent his expulsion from the Mounted SA. He was reduced in rank for inhuman cruelty to animals and struck from the membership list. A year passed before he gained admittance to the Home Guard, which was later incorporated into the Waffen-SS.
Once upon a time there was a grocer who closed his shop one November day because something was going on in the city, took his son Oskar by the hand and traveled with the Number Five tram to Langgasser Gate, because the synagogue there was on fire, as were those in Zoppot and Langfuhr. The synagogue was burned almost to the ground, and the firemen were making sure the fire didn't spread to the surrounding buildings. Outside the ruins, civilians and men in uniforms were piling up books, sacral objects, and strange pieces of cloth. The mound was set ablaze, and the grocer took the opportunity to warm his hands and his passions at the public fire. His son Oskar, however, seeing his father so involved and inflamed, slipped away unnoticed and hurried off toward the Arsenal Arcade, because he was worried about his drums of white and red lacquered tin.
Once upon a time there was a toy merchant named Sigismund Markus, and he sold, among other things, white and red lacquered tin drums. Oskar, mentioned above, was the major customer for these tin drums, for he was a drummer by trade, and could neither live without a drum nor wished to. He hurried away from the burning synagogue to the Arsenal Arcade, for there dwelt the keeper of his drums; but he found him in a state that made it impossible for him ever to sell tin drums again in this world.
The same ordnance specialists I, Oskar, thought I'd run away from had visited Markus before I got there, had dipped a brush in paint and written the words Jewish Swine across his shop window in Sütterlin script, then, perhaps displeased with their own handwriting, had kicked in the window with the heels of their boots, so that the slur they had cast on Markus could now only be guessed at. Disdaining the door, they had made their way into the shop through the window and were now playing in their own deliberate way with the toys.
I found them at play, as I too stepped into the shop through the window. A few had pulled down their trousers, had deposited brown sausages, in which half-digested peas could still be discerned, on sailing ships, fiddling monkeys, and my drums. They all looked like Meyn the musician, were wearing Meyn's SA uniform, but Meyn wasn't there, just as those who were there weren't somewhere else. One of them had drawn his dagger. He was slicing dolls open and seemed disappointed each time nothing but sawdust flowed forth from plump bodies and limbs.
I was worried about my drums. They didn't like my drums. My own drum couldn't stand up to their rage, had to keep quiet and bend at the knee. But Markus had escaped their rage. When they wished to speak with him in his office, they didn't bother to knock at the door but broke it down instead, although it wasn't locked.
Behind his desk sat the toy merchant. He was wearing sleeve protectors as usual over his dark gray everyday jacket. Dandruff on his shoulders revealed a scalp problem. A man with Punch and Judy dolls on his fingers poked him woodenly with Punch's grandmother, but Markus was no longer in, could no longer be harmed. Before him on the desk top stood a water glass that thirst must have urged him to empty at the very moment the splintering cry of a window in his shop turned his throat dry.
Once upon a time there was a tin-drummer named Oskar. When they took away his toy merchant and destroyed the merchant's shop, he sensed that bad times were ahead for midget tin-drummers like him. So as he left the shop he pulled one undamaged drum and two slightly damaged ones from the debris, and left the Arsenal Arcade for the Kohlenmarkt with the drums round his neck to look for his father, who might be looking for him. It was a late November morning. Outside the Stadt-Theater, near the tram stop, stood pious women and shivering, ugly girls handing out religious tracts, collecting money in tin cans, and displaying between two poles a banner with an inscription from First Corinthians, chapter thirteen. "Faith—Hope—Love"—Oskar read those three little words and played with them like a juggler with bottles: faith healer, hope chest, lovebird, Old Faithful, Hope Diamond, Lovers' Leap, with love as always, hope to see you again, faithfully yours. An entire gullible nation believed faithfully in Santa Claus. But Santa Claus was really the Gasman. In faith I believe it smelled of walnuts and almonds. But it smelled of gas. Soon it will be what's called first Advent. And the first and second through fourth Advent will be turned on like a gas cock, so t
hat it smells believably of walnuts and almonds, so that all those nutcrackers can take comfort in belief:
He's coming! He's coming! And who came? The Christ Child, the Savior? Or was it the heavenly Gasman with the gas meter under his arm, ticking away? And he said: I am the Savior of this world, without me you can't cook. And he was open to reason, he offered special rates, turned on the freshly polished gas cocks and let the Holy Spirit pour forth, so that the dove could be cooked. And gave out walnuts and almonds in the shell, which were promptly cracked, and they too poured forth Spirit and gas, so that the gullible were easily gulled, saw all the gasmen in the increasingly thick and bluish air outside the department stores as Santa Clauses and Christ Children in all sizes and prices. And so they believed in the only true and saving Gas Company, which symbolized fate with its rising and falling gas meters, and staged an Advent season at standard prices, one many in fact believed would bring them the Christmas they expected, but only those for whom the store of wal nuts and almonds was insufficient survived the holidays—though all had believed there was plenty for everyone.
But once belief in Santa Claus turned out to be faith in the Gasman, they tried love, abandoning the order of things in Corinthians: I love you, they said, oh, I love you. Do you love yourself too? Do you love me, tell me, do you really love me? I love myself too. And out of sheer love they called each other little radish, loved little radishes, bit into each other, one little radish biting off the other's little radish in love. And told one another stories of wonderful heavenly love among little radishes, and earthly love too, and whispered just before biting down, fresh, hungry, and sharp: Tell me, little radish, do you love me? I love myself too.
But after they had bitten off each other's little radishes out of love, and faith in the Gasman was proclaimed the state religion, after faith and pre-anticipated love, there remained only the third white elephant from the Epistle to the Corinthians: hope. And while they still had little radishes, walnuts, and almonds to nibble on, they hoped that it would soon end, so they could start anew or continue, after the final fanfare or even during the final fanfare, that the end would soon come. And still didn't know what it was that would end. Just hoped it would soon end, end tomorrow, but, they hoped, not today; for what would they do, how begin anew, if it ended so suddenly? And when the end came, they quickly turned it to a hopeful beginning; for in our country an end is always a beginning and there is always hope in any end, even the most definitive of ends. And so it is written: As long as man hopes, again and again he will begin anew with endings full of hope.
As for me, I just don't know. I don't know, for example, who hides behind Santa Claus beards today, don't know what Ruprecht his helper has in his sack, don't know how to wring the necks of gas cocks, nor how to choke them off, for Advent is flowing forth again, or flows forth still, and I don't know if it's some trial run, don't know for whom, don't know if I believe in all good faith that they are polishing those gas cocks, one hopes with love, so they will crow, on what morn or eve I do not know, nor if it matters what hour of day; for Love knows no hour, and Hope knows no end, and Faith knows no boundaries, but knowing and not knowing are bound by time and boundaries, and generally end before their time with beards, and sacks on back, and almonds that crack, so I say again: I just don't know, don't know, for example, what's in those sausage casings, whose guts they need to fill, don't know, though the price of fillings, coarse or fine, is clearly marked, what all's included in the price, don't know which dictionaries they filch the names of fillings from, don't know what fills those dictionaries, fills those casings, don't know what flesh, don't know what tongue: a word has a meaning, a butcher is silent, I cut slices off, you open books up, I read what I like, you don't know what you like: slices of sausage and quotes from those casings and books—and we'll never know who had to fall silent, to say not a word, so guts could be filled and books could be heard, stuffed tight, jam-packed, thickly written, and still I don't know, and yet I sense it darkly: the same butchers fill both dictionaries and guts with language and sausage, and there is no Paul, the man was called Saul, and Saul he remained and wrote as Saul to the people of Corinth in praise of those amazingly low-priced sausages he called Faith, Hope, and Love, so easy to digest, which, in the ever changing form of Saul, he palms off on mankind to this very day.
As for me, they took away my toy merchant, tried to banish all toys from the world along with him.
Once upon a time there was a musician named Meyn, and he played the trumpet too beautifully for words.
Once upon a time there was a toy merchant named Markus, and he sold white and red lacquered tin drums.
Once upon a time there was a musician named Meyn, and he had four cats, one of them named Bismarck.
Once upon a time there was a tin-drummer named Oskar, and he depended on the toy merchant.
Once upon a time there was a musician named Meyn, and he slew his four cats with a poker.
Once upon a time there was a clockmaker named Laubschad, and he belonged to the SPCA.
Once upon a time there was a tin-drummer named Oskar, and they took away his toy merchant.
Once upon a time there was a toy merchant named Markus, and he took along all the toys when he left this world.
Once upon a time there was a musician named Meyn, and if he's not dead, he's still alive today, playing his trumpet again, too beautifully for words.
BOOK TWO
Scrap Metal
Visitors day: Maria brought me a new drum. She passed the drum over the bed rails and was about to hand me the receipt as well, but I waved it off and pressed the button at the head of my bed till Bruno, my keeper, arrived and did what he always does when Maria brings me a new tin drum wrapped in blue paper. He undid the string on the package, let the wrapping paper fall open, lifted out the drum with almost ceremonial solemnity, and carefully folded the paper. Only then did Bruno stride—and when I say stride, I mean stride—to the washbasin with the new drum, run hot water, and without scraping the white and red lacquer, carefully loosen the price tag from the frame.
When, after a brief and not overly tiring visit, Maria prepared to depart, she took along the old drum I'd battered to death during my description of Truczinski's back, the galleon's wooden figurehead, and my somewhat overly personal interpretation of the First Letter to the Corinthians, to store it in our cellar with all the other worn-out instruments that had served both my professional and private needs.
Before Maria left, she said, "The cellar's getting mighty crowded. Just where am I supposed to put the winter potatoes?"
Smiling, I ignored this complaint from the housewife in Maria and asked her to duly record the retired drum by numbering it in black ink and entering the data and concise details concerning its career, which I'd indicated on a slip of paper, in the log that's been hanging on the inside of the cellar door for some years now and which knows all about my drums from nineteen forty-nine on.
Maria nodded in resignation and kissed me goodbye. She still finds my sense of order incomprehensible and somewhat weird. Oskar can well understand Maria's reservations; indeed, he hardly knows himself why this odd pedantry has led him to collect worn-out tin drums. He doesn't want to lay eyes again on that pile of scrap metal in the potato cellar of the Bilk apartment for as long as he lives. He knows from experience that children scorn their fathers' collections, and that one day, when his son Kurt inherits all those unfortunate drums, he won't give a rap for or on them.
What drives me then, every three weeks, to issue instructions to Maria which, if regularly followed, will one day fill our cellar and leave no room for winter potatoes?
Not until several dozen drums had already been stored in the cellar did the idée fixe seize me that some museum might eventually find my disabled drums of interest, an idea that flares up less and less frequently these days. So that can't have been the source of my passion for collecting. Rather—and the more I think about it, the more likely this seems—the source of t
his passion for collecting has a simple psychological explanation: that there might be a shortage of tin drums someday, that they might become rare, be banned, fall prey to total destruction. That someday Oskar might find himself forced to have a few of the less damaged ones repaired by a tinsmith, so that with the aid of those patched-up veterans I might survive a drumless and terrible era.
The doctors at the mental institution say much the same thing about the source of my obsession, though they use different terms. Fräulein Dr. Hornstetter even wanted to know the exact date of the birth of my complex. I could tell her with some precision: it was the tenth of November in thirty-eight, for that was the day on which I lost Sigismund Markus, the custodian of my storehouse of drums. Even though it had been difficult to procure new drums in a timely fashion following my poor mama's death, which of necessity brought the Thursday visits to the Arsenal Arcade to an end, while Matzerath was slipshod at best about my drums and Jan Bronski came by our place less and less often, my situation became all the more hopeless when the toy merchant's shop was destroyed and the sight of Markus sitting at his bare desk made perfectly clear: Markus won't be giving you drums anymore, Markus no longer deals in toys, Markus has broken off all business relations with the firm that used to manufacture and deliver beautifully lacquered red and white tin drums to you.