Malina

by Ingeborg Bachmann

  * * *

  Excellency, Generalissimo, Malina Esq., again I must ask you something. Is there a legacy?

  What do you want with a legacy? What do you mean by that?

  I would like to keep and preserve the Privacy of Mail. But I would also like to leave something behind. Are you deliberately not understanding me?

  * * *

  Since Malina is sleeping, I begin to write. Fräulein Jellinek has been married for a long time, no one is around anymore to write letters for me, organize and file.

  * * *

  Esteemed Herr Richter:

  You were kind enough to assist me, in the most friendly manner, with a few legal questions which I considered completely insignificant. Mostly I have in mind the case of B. Of course this case is not important to me. However since you are a lawyer, and since back then I could turn to you in complete trust, and since you were so extremely generous with your help, without even charging me, and since today in Vienna I have no one I might turn to, I would like to ask you how one goes about writing a will. There are some things I must put in order, I have always lived in the utmost disorder, but it seems the time has come when even I have to come into some kind of order. Do you think, for example, that it’s enough to write longhand, or that I should meet with you or that I . . .

  * * *

  Dear Herr Doktor Richter:

  I am writing you in the utmost anxiety, in the greatest haste, because . . . I am writing you in the utmost anxiety, I would still like to put some things in order, it doesn’t involve much, only my papers, a few objects to which I am, however, very attached, and I wouldn’t want these objects to fall into the hands of strangers. Unfortunately I am at my wits’ end, I may only assure you that I’ve thought everything through very exactly. Since I have no dependents, I wish (is this legally valid?) for some things to belong to a certain person forever: a blue glass cube, particularly a small coffee cup with a green edge and an old Chinese good-luck charm which depicts the heavens, the earth, the moon, and nothing more. I will then specify the name. My papers, on the other hand, and this much you yourself may know about my untenable position . . . I haven’t eaten anything for days, I am no longer able to eat or sleep, moreover it has nothing to do with money, since I don’t have any left, I am fully isolated in Vienna, cut off from the rest of the world where people earn money and eat, and since my situation may already be . . .

  * * *

  Esteemed and dear Herr Doktor Richter,

  No one will know better than you that I am forced to make out a will on account of various circumstances. Testaments, cemeteries, final dispositions have always, in every case, from the very beginning, filled me with the greatest horror, probably no one needs a testament anyway. Nevertheless I am turning to you today, because you, as a lawyer, may be able to understand my position, which is completely unsettled and unexplained and perhaps inexplicable as well, and put it in some kind of order, which I greatly long for. All my personal, my most private things are to be passed on to a certain person, the name is enclosed on a separate piece of paper. Another question occurs to me concerning my papers. Every page has been written on and they are all without any value, to be sure, I’ve never owned any papers of value, no stock certificates or securities. Even so it is very important to me that my papers be handed over only to Herr Malina, whom, if I remember, you once saw during your all too brief stay in Vienna. But I no longer remember very exactly, I could be mistaken, in any case, in case of emergency, I give you the name of this person . . .

  * * *

  Dear Herr Doktor Richter:

  I am writing you in the utmost anxiety, in the greatest haste, I am completely incapable of thinking straight, but who ever did think straight? My situation has become completely untenable, perhaps it always was. But in the end it should be said: It was not Herr Malina, nor was it Ivan, a name which says nothing to you. Later I will explain to you what he has to do with my life. Whatever happens to my most personal belongings has no meaning for me today.

  * * *

  Esteemed and dear Herr Richter, Esq.

  I am perhaps presuming too much of you, but I am writing to you in the utmost anxiety, in the greatest haste. Can you, as a lawyer so well versed in the law, reveal to me how one composes a valid will? Unfortunately I don’t know, but I am forced for various reasons . . .

  Please answer me immediately, if possible immediately upon receipt of my letter!

  Vienna, . . .

  An unknown woman

  It’s Malina’s day off, I would have preferred to spend the day by myself, but nothing can move Malina out of the house, even though there’s some hostility between us. It starts with his being annoyed and hungry, we eat earlier than usual, I light the candelabra that otherwise burns only for Ivan. The table seems to me to be properly set, but there’s only cold meat, unfortunately I forgot the bread. Of course Malina doesn’t say anything, but I know what he is thinking.

  * * *

  Me:

  * * *

  Since when do we have a crack in the wall?

  Malina:

  I don’t remember, it must have been there a long time.

  Me:

  Since when do we have that dark patch over the radiator?

  Malina:

  We have to have something on the walls if we don’t hang any pictures.

  Me:

  I need white walls, harmless walls, otherwise I immediately see myself living in Goya’s last room. Think about the dog poking his head out of the depths, all the dark sinister things on the wall, from his last period. You should have never been allowed to show me that room in Madrid.

  Malina:

  I was never in Madrid with you. Don’t tell stories.

  Me:

  That doesn’t matter in the least, in any case I was there, Monseigneur, with or without your permission. I’m finding spider webs up on the walls, look how they’ve woven everything together!

  Malina:

  Don’t you have anything to wear, why are you wearing my old robe?

  Me:

  Because I really don’t have anything else to wear. Didn’t you ever come across the sentence: siam contenti, sono un uomo, ho fetto questa caricatura.

  Malina:

  I believe it’s sono dio. The gods die many, many deaths.

  Me:

  People do, not gods.

  Malina:

  Why do you always make corrections like that?

  Me:

  I’m allowed to make them because I have become a caricature, in spirit and in flesh. Are we satisfied now?

  * * *

  Malina goes to his room, and comes back with a box of matches. The candles have burned down. I forgot to buy new ones. Malina simply has to do without. I could again ask him for advice, ask what’s going on and how it’s going on, although I’m feeling the tension and hostility more and more distinctly.

  * * *

  Me:

  * * *

  Something must have gone wrong with the primates and later with the hominids. A man, a woman . . . strange words, a strange madness! Which of the two of us will pass summa cum laude? I, me, myself — that’s all been a mistake for me. Is “I” perhaps an object?

  Malina:

  No.

  Me:

  But is it here and today?

  Malina:

  Yes.

  Me:

 
Does it have a story?

  Malina:

  Not anymore.

  Me:

  Can you touch it?

  Malina:

  Never.

  Me:

  But you have to hold on to me!

  Malina:

  Do I have to? How do you want to be taken?

  Me:

  (con fuoco) I hate you.

  Malina:

  Are you speaking to me, did you say something?

  Me:

  (forte) Herr von Malina, Your Grace, Magnificence! (crescendo) Your Lordship, Omnipotence, I hate you, sir! (fortissimo) Exchange me as far as I’m concerned, let’s trade, your Honor! (tutto il clavicembalo) I hate you! (perdendo le forze, dolente) Please, keep me all the same. I’ve never hated you.

  Malina:

  I don’t believe a single word you’re saying, just all your words at once.

  Me:

  (dolente) Don’t leave me! (cantabile assai) You — leaving me! (senza pedale) I wanted to tell a story, but I won’t do it. (mesto) You alone are disturbing me in my remembering, (tempo giusto) You go and take over the stories — from which the big story is constructed. Take them all away from me.

  I’ve cleared off the table, but there’s still more to clear up. There will be no more letters, telegrams and postcards. Ivan won’t be leaving Vienna in the near future. But even afterward and still later — nothing more will come. I am looking for a special place in the apartment, for a secret drawer, because I’m walking up and down carrying a small bundle. There has to be a drawer in my desk which will never again pop out, which no one will be able to open. Or else I could pry up part of the parquet floor with a crowbar, hide the letters there, put the flooring back in place and seal it, as long as I’m still sovereign of my dominion. Malina is reading a book, presumably: “For it is futile to try to feign indifference concerning inquiries whose object cannot be indifferent to human nature.” Every now and then he glances up, annoyed, as if he didn’t know I’m walking around with a bundle of letters, looking for a place to hide them.

  I am kneeling on the floor, it is not Mecca and not Jerusalem I am bowing to. I no longer bow to anything, all I have to do is to pull out the lowest drawer of the desk, the one that catches and is so hard to open. I have to be very quiet, so Malina won’t see which place I’ve chosen, but then the knot comes undone, the letters slide out in a mess, I tie them back together clumsily and force them through a crack into the drawer, but then take them right back out, fearful that the letters might have disappeared already. I forgot to write something on the wrapping paper, something in case these letters wind up being found by strangers after all, following an auction where my desk was on the block. The importance would have to be conveyed with very few words: These are the only letters . . . these letters are the only letters . . . the letters, which reached me . . . My only letters!

  I can’t find the words for the uniqueness of Ivan’s letters, and I have to give up before I am discovered. The drawer gets stuck. I press it shut with all my weight, but quietly, lock it, and slip the key into Malina’s old robe which is flopping around me.

  * * *

  I sit down in the living room opposite Malina, he shuts his book and looks at me inquisitively.

  Are you finished?

  I nod, I am finished.

  Why are you just sitting there instead of finally making us some coffee?

  I look at Malina gently, thinking that now I ought to tell him something terrible, something which will separate us forever and render any further word between us impossible. But I stand up and walk slowly out of the room, I turn around in the door and do not hear myself saying anything terrible, just something else, cantabile and dolcissimo:

  As you like. I’ll put the coffee on at once.

  * * *

  I am standing in front of the stove, waiting for the water to boil, I spoon some coffee into the filter and think and am still thinking, I must have reached a point where thought is so necessary it is no longer possible, my head sinks into my shoulders, I get hot since my face is too near to the burner. Nous allons à l’Esprit! But I can still make this coffee. I’d just like to know what Malina is doing in the room, what he’s thinking about me, since I’m wondering a little about him, too, although my thoughts are traveling far beyond him and me. I bustle about, warm the coffee pot and place the two little Augarten cups on the tray in front of me, where they are impossible to overlook, just as it’s impossible to ignore the fact that I’m standing here, still thinking.

  * * *

  Once upon a time there was a princess, once the Hungarian Hussars rode up from the vast land whose expanses were yet unexplored, once upon a time the willows hissed on the Danube, once upon a time there was a bouquet of Turk’s-cap lilies and a black mantle . . . My kingdom, my Ungargassenland, which I have held with my mortal hands, my glorious land, now no larger than the burner on my stove, which is beginning to glow, as the rest of the water drips through the filter . . . I have to watch out that I don’t fall face-first onto the stove, that I don’t disfigure myself, burn myself, then Malina would have to call the police and the ambulance, he would have to confess his negligence at having let a woman burn halfway to death. I stand up straight, my face glowing from the red plate on the stove, where I so often burned scraps of paper at night, not so much to burn something written, but to light one last and one very last cigarette. But I no longer smoke. I’ve given it up as of today. I can turn the knob back to 0. Once upon a time, but I’m not burning, I keep myself upright, the coffee is ready, the lid is on the pot. I’m finished. From a window overlooking the courtyard you can hear music, qu’il fait bon, fait bon. My hands aren’t shaking, I carry the tray into the room, I pour the coffee obediently, as always — two spoonfuls of sugar for Malina and none for me. I sit across from Malina and we drink our coffee in dead silence. What’s the matter with Malina? He doesn’t thank me, doesn’t smile, doesn’t break the silence and he makes no suggestions for the evening. But it’s his day off, and he doesn’t want anything from me.

  * * *

  I stare unwaveringly at Malina, but he doesn’t look up. I stand up, thinking that if he doesn’t say something immediately, if he doesn’t stop me, it will be murder, and I step away since I can no longer say it. It’s not so frightening anymore, just that our falling apart is more frightening than any falling out. I have lived in Ivan and I die in Malina.

  * * *

  Malina is still drinking his coffee. You can hear a “Helloo” from the other window overlooking the courtyard. I’ve stepped over to the wall, I walk into the wall, holding my breath. I should have written a note: It wasn’t Malina. But the wall opens, I am inside the wall, all Malina can see is the crack we’ve been seeing all along. He’ll think I’ve left the room.

  * * *

  The phone rings, Malina picks it up, he plays with my sunglasses and breaks them, then he plays with a blue glass cube that actually belongs to me. Sender never thanked, donor unknown. But he’s not just playing, since he’s already moving my candelabra out of the way. He says: Hello! For a while nothing, then Malina says coldly, impatiently, you’ve dialed the wrong number.

  He’s broken my glasses, he tosses them into the wastebasket, they are my eyes, he hurls the glass cube in after them, it is the second stone from a dream, he makes my coffee cup disappear, he tries to break a record, but it doesn’t break, it just bends, giving the greatest resistance before it finally does crack, he clears the table, he tears up a few letters, he throws away my legacy, everything lands in the wastebasket. He drops a tin box with sleeping tablets i
n between the scraps of paper, looks around for something else, he moves the candelabra even further away and finally hides it, as if the children could ever reach it, and there is something inside the wall, something that can no longer cry out, but cries out nonetheless: Ivan!