The cracking sound starts up again, a door is opened in back, the vapor vanishes, they drive in a new lot of hogs, there you run while I walk in front through the sliding door, funny rosy creatures, jolly hams, jolly little curly tails, backs with motley colored stripes. And they sniff in the new pen. It’s cold as the old one, but there is still something wet on the floor, something unknown, a red lubricity. They sniff at it with their snouts.
A pallid young man with slick blond hair has a cigar in his mouth. Look here, that’s the last man who will occupy himself with you. Don’t think ill of him, he is doing his official duty. He has to settle an administrative matter with you. He is dressed only in his boots, trousers, shirt and suspenders, the boots come up over his knees. That’s his official garb. He takes his cigar out of his mouth, lays it on a shelf on the wall, takes a long hatchet from out the corner. It is the sign of his official dignity, of his rank over you, like the brass badge of a detective. He’ll soon flash it at you. The young man takes a long wooden pole, lifts it up to the height of his shoulders over the squeaking little pigs which are rooting, sniffing and grunting undisturbed down below. The man walks around, looking down, searching, searching. The problem at stake is an inquiry against John Doe, John Doe in the case of X vs. Y. -Bing, one of them has run in front of his feet. bing, another one. The man is quick, he has given an account of himself, the hatchet has whizzed down, plunged into the lot of them with its blunt side, first on one head, then on another. That was a great moment! Kicking, writhing. Flinging from side to side. No longer conscious. Just lying there. What are those legs and heads doing? But the pig isn’t doing that, it’s the legs that do it, on their own, you might say. And already two men have begun to look across from the scalding room; it’s time for them now, they lift a slide onto the killing-pen, drag out the animal, they sharpen their long knives on the stone and kneel down, slash, slash, they thrust them into the throat, zzing, a long slit, a very long slit in the throat, the animal is opened up like a bag, deep, plunging cuts, the animal twitches, kicks, thrashes about, it is unconscious, no more than unconscious now, more’s to come, it squeals, and now for the opening of the veins in the throat. It is profoundly unconscious, we have stepped into metaphysics, into theology, my child, you no longer walk on earth, we’re wandering now on the clouds. Hurry up with the pan now, the black warm blood streams into it, foams and bubbles in the pan, stir it quickly. The blood coagulates in the body, forms clots and stops up wounds. Now it has left the body, and it still wants to coagulate. Like a child that keeps on crying Mama, Mama, when it lies on the operating table, but there is no question of Mama, and Mama does not come, but it’s suffocating under the mask with the ether, it goes on crying till it can cry no longer: Mama. Zzing, zzing, the veins, right and left. Stir it quickly. That’s it. Now the twitching stops. Now you are still. We are through with physiology and theology, physics begins.
The man who was kneeling gets up. His knees hurt him. The pig has to be scalded, gutted, then hacked up; this is done step by step. The boss, looking well-fed, wanders up and down through the steam, puffing at his pipe, glancing from time to time at an open belly. On the wall next to the swinging door hangs a poster: Annual Ball, First Section of Live-Stock Shippers, Saalbau, Friedrichshain, Kermbach Orchestra. Outside are posters announcing boxing matches. Germania Halls, Chausseestrasse 110, Entrance from 1.50 to 10 marks, 4 Qualification Matches.
Supply at the cattle-market: 1399 steers, 2700 calves, 4654 sheep, 18,864 hogs. Market conditions: prime steers firm, otherwise quiet. Calves firm, sheep quiet, hogs opening firm, closing weak, overweights lagging.
The wind blows through the driveway, it is raining. The cattle bleat as several men drive a big, roaring, horned herd into the place. The animals close in on each other, they stop in their tracks, then run in the wrong direction while the drivers chase them with sticks. A bull jumps up on a cow in the middle of the bunch, the cow runs right and left, the bull is after her, hugely he rises up on her again and again.
A big, white steer is driven into the slaughter-hall. Here there is no vapor, no pen like they have for the swarming pigs. The big strong animal, the steer, steps in alone, between its drivers through the gate. The bloodbespattered hall lies open before it with the chopped-up bones, and the halves and quarters hanging about. The big steer has a broad forehead. With sticks and thrusts it is driven up to the butcher. In order to make it stand stilL he gives it a slight blow on the hind leg with the flat part of the hatchet. One of the drivers seizes it from below around the neck. The animal stands for a moment, then yields, with a curious ease, as if it agreed and was willing, after having seen everything and understood that this is its fate, and that it cannot do anything against it. Perhaps it thinks the gesture of the driver is a caress, it looks so friendly. The animal follows the tug of the driver’s arms, turns its head obliquely to one side, mouth upward.
But then the butcher stands behind it with his hammer uplifted. Don’t look around! The hammer lifted by the strong man with both his fists is behind you, above you, and then: zoom, down it comes! The muscular force of a strong man like an iron wedge in its neck! And a second later the hammer has not yet been lifted-the animal’s four legs give a spring, the whole heavy body seems to fly up with a jerk. And then as though it had no legs, the beast, the heavy body, falls down on the floor with a thud, onto its rigidly cramped legs, lies like this for a moment, drops on its side. The executioner walks around the animal from left to right, cracks it over the head, and on the temples, with another mercifully stunning blow: you will not wake up again. Then the other man beside him removes the cigar from his mouth, blows his nose, sharpens his knife, it is half as long as a sword, and kneels behind the animal’s head; its legs have already stopped their convulsive movements. With short twitching jerks it tosses the hind part of its body back and forth. The butcher searches for something on the floor and before using the knife, he calls for the basin to catch the blood. The blood is still circulating quietly inside, little disturbed, under the impulses of a mighty heart. To be sure, the spine is crushed, but the blood still flows quietly through the veins. The lungs breathe, the intestines move. Now he applies the knife, the blood will gush out, I can see it now, in a stream as thick as your arm, black, beautiful, jubilating blood. Then the whole merry party will leave the house, the guests will dance out into the open, a tumult, and gone are the happy pastures, the warm stable, the fragrant fodder, everything gone, blown away, an empty hole, darkness, a new cosmos emerges! Haha! Suddenly we see a gentleman who has bought the house, new streets being laid out, better business conditions, going to tear down everything. They bring the big basin, shove it up to him, the huge animal throws its hind legs in the air. The knife is thrust into its neck near the gullet, look carefully for the veins, they are covered with a tough skin, well safeguarded. And now it’s open, another one too, it spurts forth, hot steaming blackness, black red, the blood bubbles out over the knife, over the butcher’s arm, jubilant blood, hot blood, the guests are coming, the transformation act proceeds, from the sun came your blood, the sun hid in your body, now it surges forth again. The animal breathes with huge efforts, it amounts to suffocation, a huge irritation, it snorts and rattles. Yes, the beams are cracking. The flanks heave so fearfully that one of the men helps the beast. If you want a stone to fall, give it a push. A man jumps on top of the animal, on its body, with both legs, he stands up there, bouncing, steps on the entrails, bobs up and down, the blood should come out more quickly, all of it. And the snorting grows louder, it is a long drawn-out panting, panting away, with light defensive blows of the hind legs. The legs quiver gently. Life is going out with a snort, the breathing begins to die down. The hind quarters turn over heavily. That’s the earth, that’s gravity. The man bobs upward. The other man underneath is already preparing to turn back the hide of the neck.
Happy pastures, damp warm stable.
The well-lighted butcher shop. The lighting of the store and that of the show-window
should be made to harmonize. Predominantly direct or semi-indirect lighting should be used. In general, fixtures for predominantly direct lighting are practical, because store, desk, and chopping block, above all, should be well lighted. Artificial daylight obtained by the use of blue-filter lamps, cannot be considered for butcher shops, because meat always demands lighting under which the natural meat color does not suffer.
Stuffed pig’s feet. After the feet have been well cleaned, they are split lengthways, so that the rind remains whole; then they are laid together and tied with a thread.
-Franz, for two weeks you haven’t stirred out of your wretched room. Your landlady is soon going to give you the air. You can’t pay her, the woman doesn’t rent rooms for the fun of it. If you don’t pull yourself together soon, you’ll have to go to the poor-house. And then what: well, what? You don’t let any air into your hole, you won’t go to the barber, you’re getting a full brown beard, you certainly could dig up the necessary 15 pfennigs from somewhere.
Conversation with Job, it’s up to you, Job, you don’t want it
After Job had lost everything, everything men can lose, neither more nor less, he was lying one day in the cabbage garden.
“Job, you are lying in the cabbage garden, by the dog-kennel. just far enough away so that the watchdog cannot bite you. You hear the gnashing of its teeth. The dog barks at every approaching step. When you turn around, when you want to rise up, it growls, lunges forward, tears at its chains, jumps up, slavers and snaps.
“Job, there is the palace, and these are the gardens and the fields you yourself once possessed. You did not even know this watchdog, this cabbage garden, into which you have been thrown; you did not even know them, nor did you know the goats which are driven past you in the morning and which pull at the grass as they pass by and chew on it and stuff their cheeks full. They belonged to you.
“Job, you have lost everything. You are allowed to creep into the barn at night. People are afraid of your sore boils. You rode in splendor over your estate and they crowded about you. Now you have a wooden fence in front of your nose, with little snails creeping up on it. You may also study the earthworms. They are the only creatures which are not afraid of you.
“Only at times do you open your scale-covered eyes, 0 heap of misfortune, 0 living morass, that you are.
“What tortures you most. Job? That you have lost your sons and daughters, that you do not possess anything, that you freeze in the night. your sore boils in your mouth, or on your nose? Which is it. Job?”
“Who is asking?”
“I am only a voice.”
“A voice comes out of a throat.”
“You think I must be a human being?”
“Yes, and that’s why I do not want to see you. Go away.”
“I am only a voice, Job, open your eyes, as wide as you can, you will not see me.” “Ah, I am raving. My head, my brain, I am now being driven crazy, too, now even my thoughts are to be taken from me.”
“And if this happens, will it matter?”
“I don’t want it to happen.”
“Although you suffer so, and although you suffer so through your thoughts, you don’t want to lose them?”
“Don’t ask questions, go away.”
“But I shan’t take them away from you. I only want to know what tortures you most.”
“That’s nobody’s business.”
“Nobody’s but your own?”
“Yes. Yes. Not yours.”
The dog barks, snarls, bites. The voice comes back after a while.
“Is it for your sons you lament?”
“Nobody need pray for me when I am dead. I am poison for the earth. Men must spit after me. Job must be forgotten.”
“For your daughters?”
“The daughters, ah. They are also dead. They are well off now. They were wonderful women. They would have given me grandchildren, and now they have been carried off. One after the other they fell, as if God had taken them by their hair, lifted them up, and thrown them down so that they broke in two.”
“Job, you are unable to open your eyes, they are glued together, they are glued together. You lament because you are lying in the cabbage garden, and the dog-kennel is the last thing left to you, and your illness.”
“That voice, O voice, whose voice are you, and where are you hiding?”
“I don’t know the cause of your lamentation.”
“Oh, oh.”
“You groan and you don’t know it either, Job .”
“No. I have-”
“I have?”
“I have no strength. That’s it.”
“That’s what you would like to have.”
“No more strength to hope, no desire. I have no teeth. I am soft. I am ashamed of myself.” “That’s what you said.” “And it is true.” “Yes, you know it. That’s the most terrible thing about it.” “So it is already written on my brow. To such tatters have I fallen.”
“That’s it, Job, that’s what you suffer from most. You do not like to be weak, you would like to be able to resist, or rather be full of holes, your brain gone, your thoughts gone, and then become like a beast of the field. Make a wish.”
“You have asked me so many questions, O voice, now I believe you may question me. Heal me, if you can. Whether you be Satan or God, angel or man, heal me.”
“So you are ready to be healed by anybody?”
“Heal me.”
“Job, think it over carefully, you cannot see me. If you open your eyes, perhaps you will be frightened by me. Perhaps I demand a high and terrible price.”
“We shall see everything. You talk as though you were in earnest.”
“But suppose I should be Satan or the Evil One?”
“Heal me.”
“I am Satan.”
“Heal me.”
Then the voice retreated, grew weaker and weaker. The dog barked. . Anxiously Job listened: He is gone, I must be healed, or else I must die. He screamed. A ghastly night fell. The voice came back once more.
“And suppose I am Satan, how are you going to dispose of me?”
Job screamed: “You don’t want to heal me. Nobody wants to help me, neither God, nor Satan, nor angel, nor man.” “And you yourself?” “What of me?” “But you don’t want it.” “What?” “Who can help you, if you yourself don’t want it?” “No, no,” Job stammered. The voice facing him: “God and Satan, angels and men, all want to help you, but you don’t want it. God, for love, Satan, in order to seize you later, the angels and men, because they are the helpmeets of God and Satan, but you don’t want it.”
“No, no,” Job stammered, and shouted, and threw himself about. He screamed the whole night long. The voice called incessantly: “God and Satan, the angels and men, want to help you, you don’t want it.” Job incessantly: “No, no.” He sought to choke the voice, it grew in intensity, grew still more in intensity, it was always ahead of him one degree. All night long. Towards morning Job fell on his face. In silence lay Job.
That day his first sores began to heal.
And they all have the same Breath, and Men have no more than Beasts
Cattle-market supply: Hogs 11,543, Beef 2016, Calves 1920, Mutton 4450.
But what is this man doing with the cute little calf? He leads it in alone by a rope; this is a huge hall in which the bulls roar; now he takes the little animal to a bench. There are many benches side by side, next to each one there is a wooden club. He lifts the delicate little calf with both arms, puts it on the bench, it does not protest as he lays it down. Then he grasps the animal from underneath, takes hold of one hind leg with his left hand so it can’t kick. Now he grabs the rope with which he led the animal in, and ties it firmly to the wall. The animal is patient and still, there it lies, it does not know what is going to happen, it is lying uncomfortably on the wood, it bumps its ‘head against a stick and does not know what it is: but it is the end of the club which is standing on the ground and with which it will soon receive
a blow. That will be its last encounter with this world. And sure enough, the man, the simple old man, who stands there all alone, a gentle old man with a soft voice-he talks to the animal-takes the butt-end, lifts it lightly, it does not require very much strength for such a delicate creature, and gives the gentle animal a blow in the neck. Quite calmly, in the same way in which he had brought the animal here and said: Now lie still, he gives it a blow in the neck, without anger, without great excitement, but also without melancholy, no, that’s the way it is, you’re a good animaL you know, of course, that’s the way it has to be.
And the little calf: prr-prr, quite, quite stiff and rigid, its little legs stretched out. The black velvet eyes of the little calf grow suddenly very big, stand stilL are edged with white; now they turn towards the side. The man knows all about that, well, that’s the way animals look, but we still have lots to do today, we must be getting on, and he looks under the little calf on the bench, his knife is lying there, with his foot he pushes the receptacle for the blood into place. Then zzing, the knife is drawn straight across the neck, through the throat, through all the cartilage, the air escapes, the muscles are slashed sidewise, the head is entirely severed, then clatters downward towards the bench. The blood spurts, a dark, red, thick, bubbling liquid. Well, that’s over with. But he keeps on cutting calmly and more deeply, his peaceful expression unchanged, he seeks and gropes in the depths with his knife, pushes through between two vertebrae, it is a very young, soft tissue. Then he takes his hand off the animal, the knife clatters down onto the bench. He washes his hands in a pail and goes off.
Berlin Alexanderplatz Page 15
