« 20 December 1937 || Table of Contents || Title Page || 23 April 1939 »
15 April 1938
Robert's 60th birthday. As I know him, best wishes would only make him grouchy. The farewell began in the train station cafeteria with käsewähe and a glass of wine, about which Robert remarked "I haven't drunk anything since New Years." At a stiff pace we began the trek to Lichtensteig, the capital of Toggenburg, some 30 kilometers away. We used narrow, isolated paths on which we met only a few churchgoers. Robert paused frequently to admire the charm of a hilltop, the dignity of a pub, the blue of the Easter day, the seclusion of a part of the landscape, or the light in a budding grove.
He sneezed many, many times, as he'd had the flu for a week.
Dagmerselen, a pretty village. Over a hill to Lichtensteig, where we arrive after a four hour walk. Hearty lunch near the town square. Afterwards to to the confectioner's from which everyone takes home a bag of Biberli (cookies with anise, cinnamon, coriander, etc.). Beer in the train station cafeteria, then a tangy Neuchateler in the Eidgenossischen Kreuz, where Robert is in good spirits. He praises the enchanting, enjoyable day, and begins making plans for our next meeting. A stroll to Wil seems worthwhile. At the train station I finally congratulate him on his birthday. He shakes my hand a number of times, and runs after my train, waving until it disappears.
From our conversations:
In Berlin Robert had completed a month-long course at a servants' school. He describes the wonderful refinement of some servants. The valet of a count hired him in a castle on hill in Upper Silesia, overlooking a village. Robert's duties were to clean the halls, polish the silver, beat the carpets and, as "Monsieur Robert," serve dinner in tails. He worked there half a year. He described the servants' school later in Jakob von Gunten. "I wasn't suited to be a servant in the long run because of my Swiss awkwardness." On one exciting occasion the castle was visited by the baroness Elisabeth von Heyking, the author of the fashionable book Letters He Never Got.
After his time as a servant his brother Karl, a painter, introduced him to the publisher Samuel Fischer. Karl at the time had become well-known because of his theater sets for Max Reinhardt, especially for Tales of Hoffman and Carmen. He painted frequently with Max Liebermann in Holland and the Ostsee. Bruno Cassirer encouraged Robert to write a novel. This resulted in Geschwister Tanner, which Cassirer didn't especially care for. One critic wrote that it was nothing but notes.
That comment came from Maximilian Harden, for whose paper Die Zukunft Robert wrote occasionally. He praised Harden's aristocratic bearing and his talent for grasping the spirit of the times in brilliant articles. He even placed him over Ludwig Boerne, whose [speech melody/intonation] he valued; he called Heine the most important German-language journalist--his roguish attitude suited the profession. He described Harden's descent, which clearly had begun with Germany's debacle in the Great War. In Zurich Robert worked for a few weeks in the branch office of Escher-Wyss Engineering Works; for a time also as a servant for a distinguished Jewess.
The best time for him was in Biel. "I didn't socialize much with the natives. I chatted with visitors who dropped in at the Blaue Kreuz, where I rented an attic room. Room 27 cost 20 francs, with full board 90 francs. My neighbors were chambermaids, sweet feminine things with a touch of the French, which I found charming."
"Why did you leave Biel?"
"I was very poor then. Also, the plots and styles I had taken from Biel and its neighborhood were beginning to dry up. Just about then my younger sister Fanny wrote and told me she had a position for me in Bern, with the canton archives. I could not refuse. Unfortunately, after six months there I had a falling-out with the director over a cheeky remark. He let me go, and I resumed the trade of writer. Under the influence of the powerful city I became less the country boy and more manly and began to write more in the international style ["mehr männlich und auf das Internationale gestellt"] than in Biel, where I used an affected and prissy style. The success was that attracted by the reputation of federal Switzerland (sic) many applications and orders arrived for me from foreign papers. There were new subjects and ideas to find."
"Brooding damaged my health in the last years in Berne. I was tortured by wild dreams: thunder, screaming, choking, hallucinatory voices, so that I often awoke screaming. Once about two AM I walked to Thun, where I arrived about 6 AM. At noon I was on the Niesen, where I happily polished off a piece of bread and a tin of sardines. That evening I was back in Thun and at midnight in Berne. On foot of course. Another time I walked from Berne to Geneva and back; once I spent the night in Geneva. One of my first [trip descriptions] was Greifensee, which Josef Viktor Widmann published in Bund. I found it damned hard to write good trip descriptions.
"A poem must be like a good suit that complements the buyer."
"Peter Altenberg: a dear Wiener Wurstl (Native of Vienna). But I can't call him a poet."
"The Austrians wouldn't have been overrun by the Nazis if they had put a saucy, charming skirt at the head of the country. Everyone would have slept underneath, even Hitler and Mussolini. Look at Queen Victoria and the Dutch Queen! Women always like to serve diplomats. How skillfully Austrian women mince about!"
"I'd rather read nothing of my contemporaries until I'm healthy. Keeping a distance is the most appropriate."
"What good is an artist's talent if he has no love?"
"Jeremias Gotthelf: for me it's just like the woman in Heinrich Pestalozzi's novel Lienhard and Gertrude' said: De Pfarrer het mi us dr Chile tribe!" (sic. Bärndeutsch?)
Speaking half in anger, half in amusement, of Mrs. A__, whom Robert had known in his youth, and who was now the wife of a well-to-do postal official. Now she dangles him, one minute bombarding him with chocolates, and the next ridiculing him with impertinent letters: "I am still not able to take you seriously." In this matter she found herself in debt to Thomas Mann, for in a letter he has demoted Robert to a "clever boy."