Berlin Alexanderplatz

by Alfred Doblin

  That afternoon, after leaving headquarters, Reinhold is upstairs with Franz, Karl the tinner is snitching on us, he says, make yourself scarce. So Franz, helped by Reinhold, gets his things packed in a quarter of an hour. They curse Karl together. Then Eva gets Toni, one of her old girl friends in Wilmersdorf to put Franz up. Reinhold rides out to Wilmersdorf in the automobile and they buy trunks together. Reinhold wants to go abroad and he needs a huge trunk; at first he chooses a wardrobe trunk, then decides on a wooden trunk, the biggest he can carry, don’t trust porters, they spy on a guy, you’ll get my address, Franz, remember me to Eva.

  Terrible disaster in Prague, 21 dead have already been brought to the surface, 150 persons are still buried; in a few minutes a new building 7 stories high was reduced to a heap of ruins, there are still many dead and injured lying underneath. The whole structure of reinforced concrete weighing nearly 1000 tons plunged into the two underground basements. The policeman on duty in the street warned passers-by when he heard sounds of cracking in the building and had the presence of mind to jump on to a street-car coming up at that moment and apply the brakes himself. Terrible storms are raging on the Atlantic. The weather report for the Atlantic ocean is as follows: cyclonic depressions, one after another, are coming from North America in an easterly direction, while the two high-pressure areas in Central America and between Greenland and Ireland, are stationary. The newspapers are full of long articles about the Graf Zeppelin and its prospective flight. Every detail of the airship’s construction, the personality of the commander and the prospects of success in the enterprise is discussed exhaustively, enthusiastic editorials extol German efficiency and the prior achievements of the Zeppelin airship. Despite all the propaganda that has been made in favor of airplanes, the airship affords, we are assured, the ideal means of air travel in the future . But the Zeppelin does not start, for Eckener will not incur needless risks.

  They open the trunk in which Mieze lay. She was the daughter of a street-car conductor from Bernau. There were three children in the family, the mother deserted her husband and left the home, why, nobody knows. Mieze was alone in the house and had to do everything herself. Sometimes at night she rode in to Berlin and went to dance-halls or to Lestmann and other places nearby, occasionally she was taken by this one or the other to a hotel; then it was too late and she didn’t dare come home, so she stayed on in Berlin and met Eva; that’s how it started. They were at the police station near the Stettin Depot. A cheerful life began then for Mieze, who at first called herself Sonia, she had many acquaintances and friends, but later on she always lived with one man, a strong fellow with one arm whom Mieze loved at first sight and to whom she remained true till the end. A bad end, a sad end, was the last end of Mieze. And why, why, why? What crime had she committed? She came from Bernau into the whirl of Berlin, she was not an innocent girl, certainly not, but her love for him was pure and steadfast; he was her man and she took care of him like a child. She was struck down because she happened by chance to encounter this man; such is life, it’s really inconceivable. She rode out to Freienwalde to protect her friend, and there she was strangled, strangled, killed, extinguished; sllch is life.

  They take the finger-prints on her throat and face, and now she’s only a case for criminal inquiry, a technical process, just as when a telephone wire is laid, that’s what she has come to. They take her death-mask, paint everything in natura) colors, it’s an exan likeness, in a kind of celluloid. So there is Mieze, her face and throat are ill a cupboard filled with legal documents, come on now, come on now, we’ll soon be home, Aschinger’s, you must console me, I’m yourn. She is displayed under glass now, face smashed, heart smashed, abdomen smashed, her smile smashed, you must console me, come along.

  So I returned and considered all the Oppressions that are done under the Sun

  Franz, why do you sigh, Franzeken? Why must Eva be always gliding up to your side and asking you what you think, and she gets no reply, must always go away without an answer? Why are you so depressed, and why must you cringe, cringe, and cringe in a little nook, behind a little curtain, and take such tiny little steps? You know life, you didn’t fall upon the earth yesterday, you have a nose for things and you can observe. But you see nothing, you hear nothing, you can only sense things, you dare not turn your eyes towards them, but look at them from the side, nor do you flee, you are too obstinate to flee, so you clench your teeth, you are no coward, only you don’t know what may happen and whether you can take up the burden, whether your shoulders are strong enough to bear it.

  How much did Job, the man from the land of Uz, suffer before he knew all and nothing could afflict him more. The Sabeans fell upon his servants, and slew them, the fire of God fell from heaven and burnt up the sheep and the servants, the Chaldeans fell upon and slew his camels and their drivers, his sons and daughters were sitting in their eldest brother’s house, and there came a wind from the wilderness and smote the four corners of the house and the young men were slain.

  That was much, but it was not enough. Job rent his mantle, bit his hands, and shaved his head and heaped ashes upon himself. But it was not yet enough. Job was stricken with sores, he had boils from the sales of his feet unto his crown, he sat down among the ashes and the pus flowed from him and he took him a potsherd to scrape himself withal.

  His friends came and visited him, Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, they came from afar to console him, they lifted up their voices and wept fearfully, they did not recognize Job; thus terribly was Job stricken. He had had seven sons and three daughters and seven thousand sheep and three thousand camels and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-asses and a very great household.

  Franz Biberkopf, you have not lost as much as did Job, the man of Uz, but it is slowly coming upon you, also. With little steps you draw yourself near to that which has befallen you, you say to yourself a thousand words of consolation, you flatter yourself, for you wish to risk it, you are resolved to draw nearer, you are resolved to affront the utmost, yea, woe is you, to affront the bitterest end. Not that, oh not that! You encourage yourself, you love yourself: come, nothing will happen, and we can’t escape, anyway. But something in you wills it, refuses it. You sigh. How can I find shelter when disaster befalls, to what can I cling? Nearer it comes. And you, too, approach it like a snail; you are no coward, not only have you strong muscles, you are Franz Biberkopf, you are the cobra. See it coiling, inch by inch around the monster, that stands there, about to seize him.

  You will lose no money, Franz, but you will be burnt up in your innermost soul! See how the whore rejoices! The whore of Babylon. And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will show unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters; and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet colored beast, having a golden cup in her hand; and upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints.

  You sense her now, you feel her. Ah, will you now be strong, will you escape destruction?

  In the pretty bright room of the Wilmersdorfer Strasse villa, Franz Biberkopf sits and waits.

  The cobra coils itself, lies basking in the sun. A great bore all this, for he’s vigorous and would like to do something, a fellow just lies around, they have not yet fixed up where to meet, fat Toni has supplied him with dark smoked glasses, I’ve got to get a brand-new outfit. I might get myself a student’s scar on my face. There’s somebody running across the courtyard. He’s in a hurry all right. Nothing comes too late for me. If only people wouldn’t hurry so much, they’d live twice as long, and get three times as much done. It’s the same thing with the six-day bicycle race, they pedal and pedal, steadily all the time, they are patient, the milk won’t boil over, let the public whistle, what do they know about it, anyhow?

  There’s a knock in the hallway. Well, why don’t they ring’? Damn it, I’ll fly the coop, but there�
��s only one exit. Let’s listen.

  With little steps you drag yourself up, you say to yourself a thousand words of consolation, you flatter yourself, lure yourself, you are ready for the utmost, but not for the very bitter, oh, not for the very bitterest end.

  Let’s listen. What’s that’? Don’t I know her’? I certainly know that voice. Screaming, crying, crying. Let’s see. Terror, haunting terror, what are you thinking of now’? There’s so much one thinks about. Sure, I know her, it’s Eva!

  The door opens. Outside stands Eva, fat Toni has her arms around her. She’s whimpering, sobbing, whatsa matter with the girl? A man thinks about so many things, all that’s happened, Mieze screaming, Reinhold lying in the bed. “Howdy, Eva. Well, Eva, old girl, well, what is it, hold on, hold on, anything happened, it’s not goin’ to be as bad as all that.” “Lemme go.” How she grunts, probably got a good whacking somewhere, somebody must have beat her up, wait a minute. She must have told Herbert something, Herbert knows something about the child. “Did he beat you up, Herbert?” “Lemme go. Don’t touch me.” Her eyes looked so queer. Now she don’t want to have anything to do with me any more. Didn’t she want it herself? Whatsa matter, anyhow? What’s wrong, more people coming, let’s bolt the door. Toni stands there, talking excitedly to Eva. “Hush, Eva, don’t worry. Now stop that, what’s wrong, come in. Where’s Herbert?” “I won’t go in, I won’t go in.” “Well, come along, let’s sit down. I’ve made some coffee. Go away Franz.” “Why should I go away, I ain’t done nothin’.”

  Then Eva’s eyes grow bigger, terribly bigger, as if she wanted to eat up somebody, she starts screaming, grabs Franz by the vest: “He’s got to come along, he’s got to come in here, he must come in here with me. You got to come here with us.” Whatsa matter with her, that woman’s crazy, has anybody told her anything? Eva starts dithering on the sofa, beside fat Toni. The girl looks bloated and shaky, that’s on account of her condition, but she got that from me, why, I ain’t goin’ to do nothin’ to her. Eva puts her arms around fat Toni and whispers something in her ear; at first she cannot speak, but then she gets it out. Now something comes over Toni, too. She slaps her hands together, while Eva dithers and takes a crumpled piece of paper out of her pocket. They’ve all gone batty. Are they trying to stage something with me or what, what’s that in the paper anyway, maybe about our job in the Stralauer Strasse? Franz stands up and shouts: those women are damned fools. “You monkeys. Don’t start makin’ scenes for my benefit, or I guess you think I’m your monkey.” “For God’s sake, for God’s sake!” Fat Toni has sat down, Eva goes on blubbering, looking in front of her; she says nothing, just whimpers and shakes. Then Franz reaches across the table and tears the paper from fat Toni’s hands.

  There are two pictures on it, one next to the other, what horrible, horrible, ghastly fright, that’s me-sure enough it’s me. But why? On account of the Stralauer Strasse business? But why? Horror of horror, that’s me and there’s Reinhold. Headline: Murder. Murder of a Prostitute in Freienwalde, Emilie Parsunke of Bernau. Mieze. What’s that? Me. Behind the stove a mouse is sitting, soon it will be flitting, flitting!

  His hand grips the page convulsively. Slowly he sinks down on to the chair, he sits all shrunken within himself. What’s that on the page? Behind the stove a mouse is sitting.

  The two women gape at him, in tears; stare with goggly eyes towards him, what’s the matter, murder? What’s that, Mieze? I’m crazy, what’s that, what does it all mean? His hand moves again towards the table, there it is in the paper, let’s read it: my picture, me, and Reinhold, murder. Emilie Parsunke of Bernau, in Freienwalde, how did she get to Freienwalde? What paper is it, anyway, the Morgenpost. His hand moves up with the paper, down with the paper. Eva, what’s Eva doing? Her look has changed, she comes over to him, her voice no longer strident: “Well, Franz?” A voice, somebody’s speaking, I must say something, two women; a murder, what is a murder, in Freienwalde, so I murdered her in Freienwalde, but I never been to Freienwalde, where is that anyhow? “Now tell me Franz, say somethin’.”

  Franz looks at her. looks at her, his big eyes staring at her. he holds the paper on the flat of his hand, his head is shaking, he reads and babbles in jerks, stumbling, crackling. Murder in Freienwalde, Emilie Parsunke of Bernau, born June 12, 1908, it’s Mieze, Eva. He scratches his cheek, looks at Eva with a vague, empty, hollow look, one can’t see down into it. It’s Mieze, Eva. It’s Mieze, Eva. Yes. What-do you say, Eva? She’s dead. That’s why we didn’t find her. “And you are in the papers, Franz.” “Me?”

  He takes the paper again and looks at it. It’s my picture.

  The upper part of his body is shivering. For God’s sake, for God’s sake, Eva! She grows more and more afraid. She moves a chair next to him. He is still rocking the upper part of his body. For God’s sake, for God’s sake! Swaying to and fro. Now he starts puffing and panting. From his face one would think he was amused. “For God’s sake, what’ll we do, Eva, what’ll we do?” “Why did they put your picture there?” “Where?” “There?” “Well, I don’t know. For God’s sake, what does it mean?” “How come, ho, ho, that’s really funny.” Now he looks at her, helplessly trembling, and she is glad, that’s a human look, tears are rolling from her eyes again, fat Toni starts whimpering, too, then his arm goes round behind her, and his hand rests on her shoulder, his face is on her neck. Franz whispers: “What’s this, Eva, what’s the matter with our Miczeken, what’s happened? She’s dead, something happened to her, now it’s out. She didn’t run away from me, somebody killed our Miezeken, my Miezeken, whatsa matter now? Is it true, tell me, it’s not true!”

  As he thinks of Miezeken something rises in him, fear arises, terror beckons him, there he is, there is that mower, Death’s his name, hatchet and staff in hand he marches o’er the land blowing’ on a little flute, he wrenches his jaws apart, and takes a trumpet, to blare upon his trumpet, and beats the kettledrum and now it looms, a doom, gloom-black, battering ram, drooms, and softly droooooms. ...

  Eva watches the slow gnashing and grinding of his Jaws and clings to Franz. His head quivers, and now his voice is heard, at first a harsh rattle, then growing softer. But not an uttered word.

  He lay beneath the auto, that was like it is now, there’s a mill there, a quarry, it goes on pouring over me, but I’ll hold fast, no matter how I hold on, it’s no use, it wants to smash me to pieces, even if I am an iron girder, it wants to break me to pieces.

  Franz murmurs through his teeth: “Something’s coming.” “What’s coming?” What mill is this, revolving wheels, a windmill, a watermill? “Watch out, Franz, they are looking for you.” So they say I killed her, me, he trembles again, his face is laughing again, I beat her once, maybe they think because I killed Ida. “Stay where you are, Franz, don’t go downstairs, where do you wanta go? They’re looking for you, they know you by that one arm.” “They won’t catch me, Eva, if I don’t want ‘em to; they won’t catch me, you can depend on that. I must go out and look at the poster column, I’ve gotta see it. I’ve gotta read it in the saloon, in the papers, the stuff they write, how it happened.” Then he stands in front of Eva, staring at her, can’t get a word out, if he only don’t start laughing. “Look at me, Eva, is there anything wrong with me, look at me.” “No, no.” She screams and clings to him. “Well, look at me, is there anything the matter with me? There must be somethin’ wrong with me.”

  No, no, she screams, and wails, while he walks to the door, smiling, takes his hat from the bureau, and is gone.

  Behold the Tears of Such as were oppressed and they had no Comforter

  Franz has an artificial arm, but, as a rule, he rarely wears it; now, however, he goes out on the street with it, the false hand in the pocket of his overcoat, in the left a cigar. He had left the house with difficulty. Eva shrieked and threw herself at his feet before the hall-door, he promised her not to run away, and to watch out. “I’ll be back for coffee,” he said, and then went downstairs.

  Th
ey did not catch Franz Biberkopf as long as he did not want to be caught. There were always two angels walking beside him, one on the left, the other on the right, who diverted people’s eyes from him.

  In the afternoon he comes upstairs for coffee at four. Herbert is there, too. Then for the first time in a long time they hear Franz talk at length. He has read the papers downstairs about his friend, Karl the tinner, he has read how he squealed on them. He does not know why he did that. So Karl the tinner went along to Freienwalde, where they had dragged Mieze. Reinhold did it by force. He had taken an auto, rode perhaps a little way with Mieze, and then Karl got in and between them they held her feet and dragged her to Freienwalde, probably at night. Maybe they had already killed her on the way. “And why did Reinhold do that?” “It was him who kicked me under the car, now you might as well know it, it was him, but it don’t matter. I’m not angry at him for it, a fellow’s gotta learn things, if he don’t, he won’t ever know nothin’. Then he runs around like a damn blockhead and knows nothin’ about the world. I’m not angry at him, nope, nope. He wanted to knock me out, he thought he’d got me in his clutches, but it didn’t happen that way, he found that out; that’s why he took Mieze from me and did that to her, it wasn’t her fault.” Oh why, that’s why. Roll of drums, battalion march, march. When the soldiers come marching along through the town, oh why, that’s why, just because of tararara taraboomdeeay.

  That’s how I marched up, and that’s how he answered me and it was a damned trick and all wrong for me to march with him.

  It was all wrong for me to march, all wrong, all wrong.

  But that doesn’t matter, now it doesn’t matter any more. Herbert opens his eyes wide. Eva can’t say a word. Herbert: “Why didn’tcha tell Mieze somethin’ about it?” “It’s not my faull, there’s nothing you can do about it, that guy mighta just as well shot me dead when I was in his room. I tell you, there’s nothin’ to be done about it.”