Peter Camenzind

  In my little room with its unhampered view of the Rhine, I studied and pondered at great length. I was disconsolate that life seemed to pass me by, that no strong current took hold of me, no great passion inflamed me or pulled me out of this stupefying trance. Besides my regular work, I was preparing a book on the lives of the early Minorites, yet this was not creative work but a patient and modest assembling of information. It did not satisfy my longing.

  Reflecting on the time I had spent in Zurich and Paris, I tried to clarify for myself the real desires, passions, and ideals of my contemporaries. One of them had set himself the task of persuading people to discard outmoded furniture, wallpaper, and fashions, introducing them to freer and more beautiful surroundings; another devoted his efforts to popularizing Haeckel's monism. Others strove for universal peace. Still another acquaintance was fighting for the impoverished lower classes, and another collected funds and lectured in behalf of building theaters and museums for the public. And here in Basel people combated alcoholism.

  All these endeavors were imbued with vigor and movement; yet none of them mattered to me. It would have made no difference to me or the kind of life I led if any or all of these objectives had been achieved. Unhappy, I sank back into my chair, pushed papers and books away, and reflected. I could hear the Rhine surging past and the wind rustling. I listened intently to this great melancholy language that seemed to suffuse everything with sadness and longing. I saw pale clouds swoop like frightened birds through the night sky, heard the Rhine coursing, and thought of my mother's death, of St. Francis, of my homeland and the snowcapped mountains, and of my friend Richard, who had drowned. I saw myself scaling precipices to pick "Alpine roses" for Rosi Girtanner, animated by music and conversation in Zurich, rowing with Erminia Aglietti in the evening; I saw myself despairing over Richard's death, voyaging and returning, convalescing and becoming miserable once more. To what purpose? Why? Oh, God, had all of it been a mere game, mere chance, a mirage? Hadn't I struggled and suffered agonies for friendship and beauty and truth? Did not the wave of longing and love still well up fiercely within me?

  Then I would be all set to go out and drink. I blew out my lamp, groped my way down the steep, winding staircase, and went into one of the wine-halls. Being a steady customer, I was received with respect, though I was usually cantankerous and sometimes unspeakably rude. I read the satirical magazine Simplicissimus, which never failed to infuriate me, drank my wine, and waited for it to soothe me. When the kind god touched me with his gentle hands, my limbs would become pleasantly weary and my soul would enter the land of dreams.

  At times it surprised me that I treated people so boorishly and derived pleasure from snapping at them. The waitresses at wine-halls I frequented feared me and cursed me as a roughneck for always finding fault with them. When I happened to enter into conversation with the other guests, I was rude or mocked them, and naturally they replied in kind. Still, I managed to latch on to several drinking companions, all of them aging, incurable alcoholics. We spent some evenings on fairly tolerable terms. Among them was an old ruffian, designer by trade, a misogynist and foul-mouthed drunk of the first order. If I happened on him in some tavern, a night-long bout of drinking invariably ensued. We would start by bantering jokes back and forth, slowly finishing our first bottle of red wine. Drinking as such gradually began to predominate, and the conversation petered out. We sat facing each other, quietly drawing on our cigars, emptying our respective bottles. We were evenly matched, refilled our bottles at the same time, and watched each other drink, half respectfully, half with malicious glee. At grape-harvest time in the late fall we once hiked through some vine-growing villages in the Markgraferland and at the Stag in Kirchen the old buzzard told me his life's story. I only remember that it was interesting and unusual; I've forgotten all the details.

  One thing I do remember is his description of a drinking bout in the later part of his life. He was out in the country somewhere at a village festival, and being seated at the table of honor, he toasted the pastor and mayor so often that they became drunk very quickly. The pastor, however, had to give a speech. After much effort was exerted to maneuver him onto the platform, he made a number of outrageous statements and was bundled off in disgrace, whereupon the mayor tried to fill the breach. He held forth in a bold and impressive manner at first, but the suddenness of the event had made him unwell and his impromptu speech ended in an unusual and indelicate manner.

  I would gladly have heard this story and others repeated by my drinking companion, but as a result of a quarrel at a shooting match, we became irreconcilable enemies. Now both of us sat in the same tavern, each at his own table, as enemies. But out of habit we watched each other, drank at the same rate, and sat there until, the last guests, we were finally asked to move on. We were never friends again.

  The interminable probing of the causes of my melancholy and my inability to cope with life was fruitless and wearying. Still I did not feel worn out or exhausted but full of dark urges, convinced that I would yet succeed in creating something deep and good, in snatching a bit of luck from life. But would this lucky moment ever come? I thought with bitterness of those high-strung modern artists who drove themselves to the pitch of artistic creation with the help of artificial stimulants, whereas I allowed my resources to lie untapped within me. I tried to analyze what kind of block or demon was constraining my soul within this vigorous body. Too, I was possessed by the notion that I was someone unusual, someone whom life had mistreated and whose suffering was unknown to anyone, who was misunderstood.

  The diabolical thing about melancholy is not that it makes you ill but that it makes you conceited and shortsighted; yes, almost arrogant. You lapse into bad taste, thinking of yourself as Heine's Atlas, whose shoulders support all the world's puzzles and agonies, as if thousands, lost in the same maze, did not endure the same agonies. In my state of isolation and estrangement I too failed to realize that the traits and peculiarities of character I took to be exclusively mine were in fact part of my family's heritage, my family's affliction, and proper to all Camenzinds.

  Every few weeks I would drop in at the home of my hospitable scholar friend. Gradually I became acquainted with most of the people who went there; there were many young academicians, quite a few of them German, who worked in a wide variety of fields; a few painters and musicians, as well as some ordinary citizens, who brought their wives. Often I would gaze at these people with a kind of astonishment. I knew that they saw one another several times a week, and I did not understand how they could have anything left to say to each other. The majority of them were stereotyped examples of homo socialis and all of them seemed to have some affinity with one another, sharing a gregariousness and superficiality that I alone lacked. Among them were quite a few fine and distinguished people whose vigor and presence of mind seemed to be not at all, or only slightly, diminished by this constant socializing. I was only able to talk to one person at a time. Rushing from one to the other, stopping only for a brief moment, making a stab at complimenting one of the ladies while attending to a cup of tea, two conversations, and the piano playing, all at one and the same time, with a look of animated amusement--that I could not do. Worst of all was when I was forced to speak about literature and art. I observed that precious little thought was given to these subjects and that they only provided occasion for much lying and gabbing.

  I lied along as well as I could, but it gave me no pleasure and I found this chitchat boring and humiliating. I much preferred to listen to a woman talking about her children or to tell about my trips or little things that had happened to me during the day or to talk about actual events. At these moments I could be almost friendly and glad. After one of these evenings, however, I usually stopped by a wine-hall and slaked my parched throat, drowning my unspeakable boredom in draughts of wine.

  At one of these gatherings I saw the dark-haired girl again. There were many people present; there was music, and the chatter grew as loud and insufferable a
s usual. I was sitting in an out-of-the-way corner with a portfolio of sketches of Tuscany on my knees. These were not the usual hackneyed little sketches of the obvious sights; they were more intimate: landscapes sketched by traveling companions and friends who had given them to my host. I even discovered among them a drawing of a small stone house with narrow windows in the isolated valley of San Clemente, a house I recognized because I had taken many walks in that region. The valley lies close to Fiesole, but most tourists never set foot there because it is virtually devoid of antiquities. It is a valley of severe yet remarkable beauty, arid and almost uninhabited, hemmed in by stark, bare mountains; remote, melancholy, pristine.

  The girl stepped up to me and looked over my shoulder.

  "Why do you spend so much time by yourself, Herr Camenzind?"

  I was annoyed. She feels neglected by the other men, I thought, and now she comes to me.

  "Well, won't you give me an answer?"

  "Excuse me. But what am I supposed to answer? I sit by myself because that's the way I like it."

  "Am I disturbing you then?"

  "You're amusing."

  "Thanks, the feeling is mutual." And she sat down. I made no attempt to put the portfolio away.

  "You're from the mountain country, aren't you?" she asked. "I wonder if you could describe it to me. My brother tells me no one but Camenzinds live in your village. Is that true?"

  "Practically," I muttered. "There's Fussli the baker, and there's an innkeeper by the name of Nydegger."

  "And the rest are all Camenzinds? Are they all related?"

  "More or less."

  I handed her a sketch. She held the sheet in such a way that I saw she knew how something like that should be handled, and I told her as much.

  "You praise me, but like a teacher." She laughed.

  "Don't you want to look at the sketch?" I asked brusquely. "If not, I can put it back with the others."

  "What is it of?"

  "San Clemente."

  "Where?"

  "Near Fiesole."

  "Have you been there?"

  "Yes, a few times."

  "What does the valley look like? This doesn't give you much of an idea."

  I thought for a moment. The stark yet beautiful landscape came into view and I half closed my eyes to hold on to the image. It was a little while before I spoke again, and I was pleased that she had not interrupted me. She seemed to realize that I was meditating.

  Then I described San Clemente as it lies parched and immense, bearing the brunt of the sun on a summer afternoon. In nearby Fiesole there is industry; people weave straw hats and baskets, or hawk souvenirs and oranges, or cheat tourists or beg from them. Florence, where the old and the new mingle, lies even farther down the valley. But Fiesole and Florence are out of sight of San Clemente. No painter has worked there, no Roman monument was erected there; human history passed this desolate valley by. Only the sun and rain do battle with the earth there, crooked pine trees maintain a precarious existence, and with their lean tops the few cypresses feel the air for oncoming storms that will cut short the miserable lives to which their parched roots cling. Occasionally an oxcart from a neighboring dairy farm will come by, or a farmer and his family will wander past on their way to Fiesole, but these are chance visitors, and the red skirts the farm women wear, which seem so smartly gay elsewhere, are out of place in San Clemente, so you don't mind leaving them out of the picture.

  I told her how I had hiked through the valley with a friend, had rested at the feet of cypress trees and leaned against their slender trunks; and how the sad and beautiful magic of the strange, lonely valley had reminded me of the valleys at home.

  Then we were both silent.

  "You are a poet," said the girl after a moment.

  I made a face.

  "I don't mean it that way," she went on. "Not because you write stories, but because you understand and love nature. It doesn't matter to most people that the wind sings in the trees or that a mountain shimmers in the sunlight. But you find life in all this, a life you can partake of."

  I replied that no one understood nature and that all searching and all desire to comprehend really complicated matters more and made one melancholy. A tree bathed in sunlight, a weathered stone, an animal, a mountain, each has life, has a tale to tell, is alive, suffers, endures, experiences joy, dies--but we don't understand it.

  As I talked, soothed by her patience and attentiveness, I looked at her more closely. Her gaze was fixed on my face, her expression calm and rapt with interest as though she were a child--or, rather, like an adult who forgets himself entirely while listening and whose eyes, unselfconsciously, again become those of a child. And as I observed her, little by little I realized, with the naive joy of revelation, that she was very beautiful.

  When I ceased speaking, she too was silent. Then, as if startled by something, she squinted into the lamplight.

  "I don't know your name, you know," I said suddenly.

  "Elizabeth."

  She left me and soon afterwards was asked to play the piano. She played well. But when I joined the group at the piano I noticed she was no longer quite as beautiful.

  As I walked down the comfortably old-fashioned staircase, I overheard a snatch of conversation between two painters who were putting on their coats in the hall.

  "At least he had a good time flirting with Elizabeth," one of them said, laughing.

  "Still waters..." said the other. "He didn't pick the worst one either."

  So those fools were already gabbing. It occurred to me that I had confided the most intimate thoughts and a good portion of my memories to this young girl, confided in her almost against my will. What had made me do it? And they were already talking, the bastards.

  I went away and avoided the house for several months. By chance, one of those two painters was the first to broach the subject when I met him in the street.

  "Why aren't you coming to the house any more?"

  "Because I'm sick of their damned gossip!"

  "Oh, yes, those women!" he laughed.

  "No," I retorted. "I mean the men, our artist friends in particular."

  During these months I saw Elizabeth only a few times on the street, once in a shop and once in the art museum. Usually she looked pretty, never beautiful. There was something unusual about the movement of her overly slim body, which, though generally it suited her, could also seem exaggerated or artificial. But that time in the museum, she was beautiful--beautiful beyond words. She did not notice me sitting on the side leafing through the catalogue; she was standing nearby, completely absorbed in a large Segantini. The painting depicted several farm girls working on sparse meadows, in the background jagged mountains which reminded me of the Stockhorn range, and above it all, in a cool, transparent sky, an exceedingly well-rendered ivory cloud. It made you reel when you set eyes on it: from its knotted, involuted mass you could see that the wind had just packed and kneaded it; the cloud was about to soar and drift away. Elizabeth had grasped this and yielded to it completely. And her soul, usually veiled, once more revealed its inner face, laughed softly out of wide-open eyes, made her small mouth childishly soft, and smoothed out the clever, severe fold between her brows. The beauty and genuineness of a great work of art made her soul display its own beauty and truth.

  I sat quietly to the side, contemplating the beautiful Segantini cloud and the lovely girl under its spell. Then I became afraid that she would turn around and want to talk to me and lose her beauty again, so quickly and silently I left the room.

  At this time I began again to delight in nature, and my attitude toward it underwent a change. Time and time again I roamed through the magnificent country surrounding the town, mainly into the Jura, which I liked best of all. Whenever I saw these woods, mountains, meadows, and orchards, I sensed that they stood there waiting for something. Perhaps for me, but certainly for love.

  And so I began to love all these things. An overpowering longing within me responded
to their silent beauty and, within myself as well, there arose the yearning to be conscious, understood, and loved.

  Many people say they "love nature," by which they mean they don't dislike the charms nature displays before them. They go on outings, delight in the beauty of the earth as they trample meadows and tear off flowers and sprigs, only to discard them or let them wilt at home. That is how they love nature. This love overcomes them on Sundays when the weather is fine and they are moved by the goodness of their hearts. Actually they have no need for such feelings, for isn't man "the crowning glory of nature"? Yes, of course, the crown!

  So I peered more and more greedily into the abyss of things. I listened to the wind sing in the trees, listened to brooks roar through gorges and gentle streams glide through the plains, and I knew these sounds were the language of God: if I understood their dark, archaic, beautiful language, it would be the rediscovery of paradise. Books make little mention of this. It is the Bible that contains the wonderful expression "the groaning and travailing of creation." Yet I felt that men through the ages had been overwhelmed by the ineffable in life, had abandoned their daily tasks and fled into seclusion to hearken to the song of creation, to contemplate the fleeting clouds, restlessly and longingly as hermits, penitents, and saints to implore the Eternal.

  Have you ever been in Pisa, in the Camposanto? Its walls are covered with the faded frescoes of past centuries, one of them depicting the life of hermits in the Theban desert. Despite its faded colors, the naive picture exudes such bliss and peace that grief suddenly overwhelms you and you long to weep away your sins and wickedness in some remote and holy place, never to return. Innumerable artists have sought thus to express their homesickness--in marvelous paintings. Any one of Ludwig Richter's affectionate paintings of children sings the same song as the frescoes in Pisa.