Jakob von Gunten

by Robert Walser

  I have met quite a number of people, thanks to Johann’s friendliness. There are artists among them, and they seem to be pleasant people. Well, what can one say after such fleeting contact? Actually, people who make efforts to be successful are terribly like each other. They all have the same face. Not really, and yet they do. They’re all alike in their rapid kindness, which just comes and goes, and I think this is because of the fear which these people feel. They deal with persons and objects, one after the other, only so that they can cope again with some new thing that also seems to be demanding attention. They don’t despise anyone, these good people, and yet perhaps they despise everything, but they aren’t allowed to show it, because they’re frightened of being suddenly incautious. They’re kind out of Weltschmerz and pleasant out of fear. And then everyone wants to be respected. These people are cavaliers. And they seem never to feel quite right. Whoever can feel right if he places value on the tokens of respect and the distinctions conferred by the world? And then I think that these people, who are, after all, society people and not living in a state of nature, are always feeling that some successor is pursuing them. Everyone senses the awful ambush, the secret thief, who comes creeping up with some new gift or other, spreading damage and humiliations of every kind all around, and therefore in these circles the completely new person is the most sought-after and most preferred, and woe to the older ones if this new one is somehow distinguished by intelligence, talent, or natural genius. I’m expressing myself rather too simply. There’s something quite different about it all. In these circles of progressive culture there’s a fairly obvious and unmistakable fatigue. Not the formal blasé-ness, say, of an aristocracy of birth, no, but a genuine, a completely authentic fatigue that dwells in higher and more lively feelings, the fatigue of the healthy-unhealthy person. They’re all cultivated, but do they respect one another? They are, if they think about it honestly, content with their positions in life, but are they really contented people? Of course, there are rich people among them. I’m not talking about them here, for the money a man has forces one to assume wholly different things when judging him. Yet they’re all well-mannered people and, in their own way, important ones, and I must be extremely grateful to my brother for acquainting me with this bit of the world. Already in those circles people like to call me the little von Gunten, in contrast to Johann, whom they have christened the big von Gunten. These are jokes, the world just likes jokes. I don’t, but it doesn’t matter, all this. I feel how little it concerns me, everything that’s called “the world,” and how grand and exciting what I privately call the world is to me. My brother has tried to introduce me to people, and it’s my duty to make much of this. And it is much, too. Even the smallest of things is much to me. To know a few people perfectly takes a lifetime. That’s another of the Benjamenta precepts, and how unlike the world the Benjamentas are. I’m going to bed now.

  I never forget that I’m a descendant beginning from all the way down, without having the qualities which one needs if one is going to rise to the top. Perhaps I have. Everything is possible, but I put no trust in the idle moments when I imagine happiness for myself, combined with splendor. I have none of the virtues of an upstart. I’m cheeky sometimes, but only as a passing mood. The upstart’s cheekiness is a permanent shamming of modesty, or his gesture is that of cheeky, permanently cheeky insignificance. And there are many upstarts, and stupidly they cling to what they have attained, and that is excellent. They may also be nervous, indignant, peevish, and fed up with “all those things,” but the fed-upness of the genuine upstart is nothing deep. Upstarts are masters, and perhaps as a descendant of my family, or whatever I am, I shall serve a master, perhaps a somewhat pompous master, and serve him honorably, loyally, reliably, steadfastly, without thinking, without the least concern for personal advantage, for only in this way, that is, with every decency, shall I be able to serve anyone at all, and now I notice that I’ve got something in common with Kraus, and I’m almost a little ashamed. Feelings like those with which I confront the world will never lead to great things, unless one snaps one’s fingers at the sparkling grandeurs and calls that great which is quite gray, quiet, hard and humble. Yes, I shall serve and I shall always accept duties whose fulfillment is anything but a glitter, this will happen over and over again, and I shall blush with utter stupid joy if anyone says a flippant word of thanks. That is stupid but completely true, and I’m incapable of being sad about it. I must confess: I’m never sad, and I never feel lonely, never, and that is also stupid, for with sentimentality, with the thing that people call the cry from the heart, the best and most upstartish and topping business is done. But thanks very much for the trouble, for the indelicate effort it takes to reach an honorable status in such a way. At home, with father and mother, the whole house smelled of tact. Well, I don’t mean literally. Things were genteel with us at home. And so bright. The entire household was like a gracious, kindly smile. Mamma is so refined. All right, then. I’m from that family and am condemned to be a servant and play a sixth-rate role in the world. In my view this is apt, for—oh, what did Johann say?—“The people with the power, they are the really starving people.” I don’t like to think that this is so. And do I need to console myself at all? Can anyone console a Jakob von Gunten? As long as I have a healthy body, there can be no question of it.

  If I want to, if I tell myself to, I can revere everything, even bad behavior, but it must have the color of money. The bad manners would have to drop twenty-mark gold pieces behind them, then I’d bow to them, and behind them as well. Herr Benjamenta is of the same opinion. He says it’s wrong to despise money and the advantages that fall from unlovely hands. A pupil at the Benjamenta Institute is supposed to respect most things, not to despise them.—Let’s change the subject. Gymnastics, I like that. I love it passionately, and of course I’m good at it. To make friends with a noble person and to do gymnastics, these are probably the best things in the world. To dance and to find a person who engages my respect is one and the same thing for me. I like so much to set minds and limbs in motion. Just to kick up one’s legs, how nice that is! Gymnastics is silly, too, and leads to nothing. Does everything I love and prefer have to lead to nothing? But listen! What’s that? Someone’s calling for me. I must stop.

  “Are you still making honest endeavors, Jakob?” the instructress asked me. It was toward evening. Some-where there was a reddish light, like the glow of an immense and lovely sunset. We were standing by the door to my room. I’d gone there a moment before, to ponder my dreams and forebodings a little. “Fräulein Benjamenta,” I said, “do you doubt the seriousness and honesty of my endeavors? Am I, in your eyes, a swindler and a cheat?” I think I was looking positively tragic as I said this. She turned her beautiful face to me and said: “Heaven forbid. You’re a nice boy. You’re impetuous, but you’re decent and pleasant, I like you, just as you are. Are you content? Are you? Well? Do you make your bed properly every morning? Yes? And you stopped obeying the rules long ago? You didn’t? Or did you? Oh, you’re a very good boy, I believe you. And no praise could be fulsome enough for you. Never. Whole buckets full of flattering praise, just think, whole pitchers and pannikins full. One would have to use a broom to sweep them all up. The many fine words of recognition for your behavior. No. Jakob, quite seriously now, listen. I must whisper something to you. Do you want to hear it or would you rather slip away into your room here?” “Tell me what it is, Fräulein, I’m listening,” I said, full of anxious expectation. Suddenly the instructress gave a great shudder. But quickly she controlled herself and said: “I must go, Jakob, I must go. And it will go with me. I just can’t tell it to you. Perhaps another time. Yes? Yes, perhaps tomorrow, or in a week. It still won’t be too late to tell you then. Tell me, Jakob, do you love me a little? Do I mean anything to you, to your young heart?” She stood there in front of me, her lips pressed angrily together. I quickly stooped to her hand, which hung unspeakably sadly down against her dress, and kissed it. I was so happ
y to be allowed to tell her now what I had always felt for her. “Do you think highly of me?” she asked, the pitch of her voice rising till it was almost stifled and died away. I said: “How could you be in any doubt? I am unhappy.” But I felt so outraged that I could have wept. I abruptly let go of her hand and stood there respectfully. And she went away, with an almost imploring look. How everything has changed in this once so tyrannical Benjamenta Institute! Everything’s collapsing, the classes, the effort, the rules. Is this a morgue, or is it a celestial house of joy? Something is going on and I don’t understand it yet.

  I ventured to make a remark to Kraus about the Benjamentas. I said that I thought the old splendor of the Institute was clouding over. I asked what it meant, and if Kraus knew anything about it. He got angry and said: “You, you’ve got yourself pregnant with silly ideas. What a notion. Do something! Work, then you won’t notice anything. You snooper. Snooping around for opinions and thoughts. Go away. I’m beginning to hate the sight of you.” “You’re getting a bit rude, aren’t you?” I said, but I thought it better to leave him alone. During the day I had a chance to talk to Fräulein Benjamenta about Kraus. She said to me: “Yes, Kraus isn’t like other people. He sits there till one needs him, if one calls him he gets moving and rushes up. One doesn’t make much fuss about people like him. Actually, one never praises Kraus, and one is hardly grateful to him. One only asks of him, Do this or Do that. And one hardly notices that he’s been of service, and how excellently so, his service is that perfect. As a person, Kraus is nothing, Kraus is something as a doer, as a person for a job, but he doesn’t make himself noticeable at all. You, for instance, Jakob, one praises you, it’s a joy to make you feel good. One hasn’t a word for Kraus, one feels no fondness for him. You’re very nasty to Kraus, Jakob. You’re nicer than he is, though. I won’t put it any other way, for you wouldn’t understand. And Kraus will be leaving us soon. That will be a loss, Jakob. Oh, that’s a loss. If Kraus isn’t there any more, who is there left? You, yes. That’s true, and now you’re angry with me, aren’t you? Yes, you’re angry with me, because I’m sad about Kraus leaving. Are you jealous?” “Not at all. I’m very sorry, too, about Kraus leaving us,” I said. I spoke intentionally in a formal sort of way. I had begun to feel sad, too, but I found it proper to be a little cold. Later I tried to have a talk with Kraus, but he was still incredibly standoffish. He sat glumly at the table and said nothing to anybody. He is also feeling that something’s not quite right here, only he doesn’t say anything, except to himself.

  Often the feeling of a great inner defeat comes over me. When it does so, I position myself in the middle of the classroom and do silly things, quite childish silly things. I put Kraus’s cap on my head, or a glass of water, et cetera. Or Hans is there. With Hans one can throw hats, trying to make them land on the other person’s head and stick there. How Kraus despises us for this. Schacht has had a job for three days, but he has come back, very depressed and with all kinds of angry, painful excuses. Didn’t I say earlier that things would go badly for Schacht out in the world? He will always wriggle into functions, tasks, and jobs and he won’t like it anywhere. Now he says he had to work too hard, and he talks about cunning, malicious, and lazy halfway superiors who began to heap unfair duties on him mischievously the moment he arrived, and to torment him utterly and to cheat him. Ah, I believe Schacht. Only too willingly; that’s to say, I think what he says is absolutely true, for the world is incomprehensibly crass, tyrannical, moody, and cruel to sickly and sensitive people. Well, Schacht will stay here for the time being. We laughed at him at bit, when he arrived, that can’t be helped either, Schacht is young and after all he can’t be allowed to think that there are special degrees, advantages, methods, and considerations for him. He has now had his first disappointment, and I’m convinced that he’ll have twenty disappointments, one after the other. Life with its savage laws is in any case for certain people a succession of discouragements and terrifying bad impressions. People like Schacht are born to feel and suffer a continuous sense of aversion. He would like to admit and welcome things, but he just can’t. Hardness and lack of compassion strike him with tenfold force, he just feels them more acutely. Poor Schacht. He’s a child and he should be able to revel in melodies and bed himself in kind, soft, carefree things. For him there should be secret splashings and birdsong. Pale and delicate evening clouds should waft him away into the kingdom of Ah, What’s Happening to Me? His hands are made for light gestures, not for work. Before him breezes should blow, and behind him sweet, friendly voices should be whispering. His eyes should be allowed to remain blissfully closed, and Schacht should be allowed to go quietly to sleep again, after being wakened in the morning in the warm, sensuous cushions. For him there is, at root, no proper activity, for every activity is for him, the way he is, improper, unnatural, and unsuitable. Compared with Schacht I’m the trueblue rawboned laborer. Ah, he’ll be crushed, and one day he’ll die in a hospital, or he’ll perish, ruined in body and soul, inside one of our modern prisons. Now he crouches around in the corners of the classroom, is ashamed of himself and trembling with dread of the repulsive unknown future. The Fräulein looks at him anxiously, but she’s at present much too concerned with her very own peculiar affairs to be much troubled about Schacht. Anyway, she couldn’t help him. A God would have to do that, and could do it perhaps, only there are no gods, only one, and he’s too sublime to help. To help and to alleviate, that wouldn’t be proper for the Almighty, at least that’s how I feel.

  Fräulein Benjamenta now says a few words to me every day, either in the kitchen or in the sometimes very quiet and empty classroom. Kraus is acting as if he reckoned on spending another decade here in the Institute. Dryly and fretfully he learns his lessons, yes, he really is fretful about it, but he always did look that way, it doesn’t mean anything special. This person isn’t capable of any overhastiness, or any impatience. “Wait for It” is written almost majestically on his tranquil brow. Yes, the Fräulein said this once, she said that Kraus has majesty, and it’s true, the unassumingness of his character has something of an invisible emperor about it. To my Fräulein I ventured to say yesterday: “If my attitude to you has ever been a single time, for a tiny, shrinking, single moment, more self-possessed than swayed by feelings and bonds of the purest respect, I will hate myself, persecute myself, hang myself with a rope, poison myself with the deadliest poisons, cut my throat with knives, no matter of what sort. No, it’s quite impossible, Fräulein. I could never do you any injury! Your very eyes. How they have always been for me the command to obey, the inviolable and beautiful commandment. No, no, I’m not telling lies. Your appearance in the doorway! I have never needed a heaven here, never needed moon, sun, and stars. You, yes, you, have been for me the higher presence. I’m speaking the truth, Fräulein, and I must assume that you can feel how far these words are from any kind of flattery. I hate all future success, I find life repugnant. Yes, yes. And yet soon I too must leave, like Kraus, and go out into hateful life. You have been my body’s health. Whenever I have read a book, it was you I was reading, not the book, you were the book. You were, you were. Often I’ve behaved badly. Several times you had to warn me against the pride that was eating me up and trying to bury me under the ruins of improper imaginings. How it subsided then, as quick as lightning. How attentively I listened to what Fräulein Benjamenta was saying. You smile? Yes, your smile has always been a spur to goodness, courage, and truth. You have always been too kind to me! Much, much too kind for such a pig-head. And at the sight of you my many failings fell at your feet, imploring forgiveness. No, I don’t want to go out into life, into the world. I despise everything that the future may hold in store. When you walked into the classroom, I was happy, and then I always scolded myself for being such a fool. Often—just think, yes, I must confess it—often, secretly, I thought to rob you of your dignity and grandeur, but I found in my raging spirit not a word, not a single little word with which to revile and reduce what it was I wa
nted to injure a little. And my punishment, every time, was my remorse and my restlessness. Yes, always, always I have had to revere you, Fräulein. Are you angry that I should speak to you so? I, I am happy to be speaking so.” She looked at me with twinkling eyes and smiled. She was a bit scornful, but she was quite content. Moreover, she was preoccupied, I noticed, with some faraway thoughts. In spirit she was somewhere else, and therefore, only for that reason, did I dare to speak to her in this way. I shall take care not to do so again.

  It’s not my concern, I know, but it’s a noticeable fact that no new pupils are entering the Institute. Is the reputation which Herr Benjamenta enjoyed in the world as an educator on the wane or even near to vanishing? That would be sad. But perhaps it’s only because I’m over--sensitive. I’ve become a little nervous here, if that’s what one can call it when one’s powers of observation are at once excited and tired. Everything has become so fragile here, and it’s as if one were standing in midair, not on firm ground. And then this being permanently prepared and alert, that does something too. It’s quite possible. One’s always waiting for something, well, that tends to weaken one. And, again, one forbids oneself to listen and wait for things, because it’s not permissible. Well, that makes claims on one’s powers as well. Often the Fräulein stands at the window and looks out for a long time, as if she were living somewhere else already. Yes, that’s it, that’s the somewhat unhealthy and unnatural way in which things are moving here: we’re all, superiors and pupils, all nearly living somewhere else. It’s as if we had only a little time left to breathe, sleep, wake up, and give and enjoy instruction here. There’s something like a rushing, ruthless energy beating its wings and fluttering about the place. Are we all listening for what’s to come? For some future happening? Also possible. And what if we present pupils all leave and no new ones arrive? What then? Will the Benjamentas be poor and forsaken? When I imagine this, I feel ill, simply ill. No, never, never! It shall never be allowed to happen. Yet it has to be. Has to be?