Jakob von Gunten

by Robert Walser

  Jacob von Gunten.

  I handed the account of my life to the Principal. He read it through, I think, twice, and he seemed to like what I had written, for the shimmering ghost of a smile crossed his lips. Oh, certainly, I was watching my man very closely. He did smile a little, that is and remains a fact. At last, then, a sign of something human. What cavortings does one have to perform in order to stir people up, people whose hands one would like to kiss, even to get from them a quite fleeting friendly gesture! Intentionally, intentionally I wrote the account of my life with such pride and cheek: “Now read it. Well? Doesn’t it make you want to fling it back in my face?” Those were my thoughts. And then he gave a fine and crafty smile, this fine and crafty Principal whom I unfortunately, unfortunately revere above all others. And I noticed it. A vanguard skirmish has been won. Today I absolutely must get up to one more little piece of mischief. Or I shall die of rejoicing and laughing. But the Fräulein is crying? What is all this? Why am I so strangely happy? Am I mad?

  I must now report a matter which will perhaps raise a few doubts. And yet what I say is quite true. There is a brother of mine living in this immense city, my only brother, in my opinion an extraordinary person, his name is Johann, and he’s something like a quite famous painter. I know nothing definite about his present situation in the world, since I have avoided visiting him. I shall not go to see him. If we should happen to meet on the street, and if he should recognize me and walk up to me, well and good, then I shall be pleased to give his brotherly hand a strong shake. But I shall never provoke such a meeting, never in my life. What am I, and what is he? I know what a pupil at the Benjamenta Institute is, it’s obvious. Such a pupil is a good round zero, nothing more. But what my brother is at the moment I cannot know. Perhaps he’s surrounded by fine, cultivated people and by God knows what formalities, and I respect formalities, therefore I don’t visit my brother, for possibly a well-groomed gentleman, giving a forced smile, might come toward me. I know Johann von Gunten from earlier times, of course. He’s just as cool and calculating as me and all the Guntens, but he’s much older, and differences of age between people and brothers are insuperable barriers. In any case, I don’t allow him to give me any pieces of good advice, and that is precisely what he will do, I fear, when he sees me, for if he sees me looking so poor and unimportant he will certainly feel provoked, as a well-situated person must, to make me feel the lowliness of my position all up and down the line, and I wouldn’t be able to put up with that, I would show my von Gunten pride and become decidedly rude, for which I would later be sorry. No, a thousand times no. What? Accept charity from my brother, my own flesh and blood? I’m sorry, it’s impossible. I imagine that he is very refined, smoking the world’s best cigar, and lying among cushions and rugs of bourgeois snugness. And why so? Yes, there’s something unbourgeois in me now, something utterly opposite to well-being, and perhaps my brother is reposing right in the midst of the loveliest, most splendid worldly well-being. It’s definite: we shall not see one another, perhaps we never shall. And it isn’t even necessary. Not necessary? Good, let’s leave it at that. Mutton-head that I am, talking about “we” like a very dignified schoolteacher. —My brother must be surrounded, certainly, by the best and most exclusive salon behavior. Merci. Oh, thank you. Women will be there, poking their heads out at the door and asking pertly: “Now who’s here again today? Oh, I say. Is he a beggar?” Thanks a lot for the welcome. I’m too kind to be pitied. Sweetly smelling flowers in the room. Oh, I don’t like flowers at all. And cool cosmopolitan people? Ghastly. Yes, I’d like to see him, I’d like very much to see him. But if I saw him like this, in splendor and all snug: bang would go the feeling that this was a brother, I’d only be able to pretend happiness, and so would he. So I won’t see him.

  During the class, we pupils sit there, gazing rigidly to the fore, motionless. I think one isn’t even allowed to blow one’s personal nose. Our hands rest on our knees and are invisible during the class. Hands are the five-fingered evidence of human vanity and rapacity, therefore they stay nicely hidden under the desk. Our schoolboy noses have the greatest spiritual similarity, they all seem to strive more or less aloft, to where insight into the confusion of life floats and glows. Pupils’ noses should look blunt and downcurved, that is what the rules demand, the rules which think of everything, and indeed, all our instruments of smell are humbly and meekly bent. It’s as if they had been trimmed with sharp knives. Our eyes always gaze into the thoughtless emptiness, the rules demand this too. Actually one shouldn’t have any eyes, for eyes are cheeky and inquisitive, and cheek and inquisitiveness are to be condemned from almost every healthy standpoint. Fairly delightful are the ears of us pupils. They hardly venture to listen, for sheer intensity of listening. They always quiver a little, as if they were frightened of being suddenly pulled in admonishment from behind, and hauled out sideways. Poor ears, having to put up with such terrors. If the sound of a call or command strikes these ears, they vibrate and tremble like harps that have been touched and disturbed. Well, now, it also happens that pupils’ ears like to sleep a little, and how they are aroused! It’s a joy. The best-trained part of us, though, is the mouth, it is always obediently and devoutly shut. And it’s only too true: an open mouth is a yawning fact, the fact that its owner is dwelling with his few thoughts in some other place than the domain and pleasure-garden of attentiveness. A firmly shut mouth indicates open, eager ears, therefore the gates down there below the nostrils must be always carefully bolted. An open mouth is just a gob, and each of us knows that perfectly well. Lips aren’t allowed to parade themselves and bloom voluptuously in the comfortable natural position, they must be folded and pressed as a sign of energetic self-denial and expectation. We pupils all do this, we treat our lips, according to the existing rules, very strictly and cruelly, and therefore we all look as grim as sergeants giving commands. A noncom wants his men, as is well known, to look as snarling and grim as he does, that suits him, for he has a sense of humor, as a rule. Seriously: people obeying usually look just like the people giving orders. A servant can’t help putting on the masks and allures of his master, in order faithfully to propagate them, as it were. Now, of course, our esteemed Fräulein isn’t a sergeant, on the contrary, she very often laughs, yes, she sometimes allows herself simply to laugh at us rule-obeying beaverboys, but she reckons that we shall quietly let her laugh, without changing our expressions, and that is just what we do, we act as if we didn’t hear the sweet silver tones of her laughter at all. What singular oddities we are. Our hair is always neatly and smoothly combed and brushed, and everyone has to cut his own parting up there in the world on his head, a canal incised into the deep black or blond hair-earth. That’s how it should be. Partings are also in the rule-book. And because we all look so charmingly barbered and parted, we all look alike, which would be a huge joke for any writer, for example, if he came on a visit to study us in our glory and littleness. This writer had better stay at home. Writers are just windbags who only want to study, make pictures and observations. To live is what matters, then the observation happens of its own accord. Our Fräulein Benjamenta would in any case let fly at such a wandering writer, blown in upon us by rain or snow, with such force that he would fall to the floor at the unfriendliness of the welcome. Then the instructress, who loves to be an autocrat, would say to us, perhaps: “Boys, help the gentleman to pick himself up.” And then we pupils of the Benjamenta Institute would show the uninvited guest the whereabouts of the door. And the morsel of inquisitive authordom would disappear again. No, these are just imaginings. Our visitors are gentlemen who want to engage us boys in their service, not people with quills behind their ears.

  Either the teachers in our institute do not exist, or they are still asleep, or they seem to have forgotten their profession. Or perhaps they are on strike, because nobody pays them their monthly wages? Strange feelings seize me when I think of the poor slumberers and absent minds. There they all sit, or slump, against the walls i
n a room specially arranged for their repose. Herr Wälchli is there, the supposed Natural History teacher. Even asleep he keeps his pipe stuck in his mouth. A pity, he would have done better as a beekeeper. How red his face still is, and how fat his oldish, softish hand. And here beside him, isn’t that Herr Blösch, the much-respected French teacher? Ah, yes, it really is he, and he’s telling lies when he supposes he’s asleep, he’s a quite terrible liar. His classes, too, consisted entirely of lies, a paper mask. How pale he looks, and how angry! He has a bad face, thick hard lips, coarse merciless features: “Are you asleep, Blösch?” He doesn’t hear. He’s really repulsive. And that one, who is he? Parson Strecker? Tall thin Parson Strecker, who teaches Scripture? The devil yes, it’s he. “Are you asleep, Parson? All right, sleep, then, there’s no harm in your sleeping. You only waste time teaching Scripture. Religion, you see, means nothing today. Sleep is more religious than all your religion. When one is asleep, one is perhaps closest to God. What do you think?” He doesn’t hear. I’ll go somewhere else. Ha, now who’s this, choosing such a comfortable position? Is it Merz, Doctor Merz, who teaches the History of Rome? Yes, it’s he, I know his pointed beard. “You seem to be angry with me Doctor Merz. Well, carry on sleeping and forget the improper scenes we had, stop scolding into your pointed beard. It’s a good thing for you to sleep. For some time past, the world has been revolving around money, not around history. All the ancient heroic virtues you unpack have lost their importance long ago, you know it yourself. Thanks for some wonderful impressions. Sleep well.” But here now, as I see, Herr von Bergen seems to have snuggled down, the boy-torturer von Bergen. Looks like he’s dreaming, and he likes so much to bestow, with such tickling-heavenly partiality, “smacks.” Or he commands: “Bend over!” and then it is such a delight for him to patch up the poor boy’s backside with his meerschaum cane. A very elegant Parisian phenomenon, but cruel. And who is this here? Headmaster Wyss? Very nice. One needn’t spend long on legitimate people. And who’s here? Bur? Schoolmaster Bur? “I’m delighted to see you.” Bur is the biggest genius of an ex-mathematics master on the continent. Only for the Benjamenta Institute he is too broad-minded and intelligent. Kraus and the others are not the right pupils for him. He is too outstanding and his demands are too high. Here in the Institute no excessive pre-conditions exist. But am I dreaming of my schoolteachers at home? In my other school there was plenty of knowledge, here there is something quite different. Something quite different to us pupils here.

  Shall I get a job soon? I hope so. My photographs and my applications make, as I presume, a favorable impression. Recently I went with Schilinski to a top-class concert-café. How Schilinski trembled all over with timorousness. I behaved approximately like his kind father. The waiter ventured, after giving us a good look up and down, to ignore us; but when I requested him, with an enormously austere expression on my face, kindly to wait upon us, he at once became polite and brought us some light beer in tall, delicately cut goblets. Ah, one must play the part. A person who can throw his chest out is treated like a gentleman. One must learn to dominate situations. I know excellently well how to throw my head back, as if I were outraged by something, no, only surprised by it. I look around, as if to say: “What’s this? What did you say? Is this a madhouse?” It works. I have also acquired a bearing in the Benjamenta Institute. Oh, I sometimes feel that it’s within my power to play with the world and all things in it just as I please. Suddenly I understand the sweet character of women. Their coquetries amuse me and I discern profundity in their trivial gestures and manners of speaking. If one doesn’t understand how it is when they raise a cup to their lips or snatch in their skirts, one will never understand them at all. Their souls go tripping along with the high-swelling heels of their sweet little boots, and their smiling is both things: a foolish habit and a piece of world history. Their conceit and their small intelligence are charming, more charming than the works of the classic authors. Often their vices are the most virtuous thing under the sun, and when they get furious and scold us? Only women know how to scold. But quiet now! I’m thinking of Mamma. How holy to me is the memory of the moments when she scolded. Quiet now, be still! What can a pupil at the Benjamenta Institute know about all these things?

  I couldn’t restrain myself, I’ve been to the office, have as usual bowed deeply, and I said to Herr Benjamenta the following words: “I have arms, legs, and hands, Herr Benjamenta, and I would like to work, and so I permit myself to ask you to obtain for me soon a job of work with pay. I know that you have all sorts of connections. To you come the most refined gentlefolk, people with crowns on their lapels of their overcoats, officers rattling sharp sabers, ladies whose robes ripple like tittering waves in their wake, older women with enormous amounts of money, old men who give a million for half a smile, people of rank, but not of intellect, people who ride about in automobiles, in a word, Principal, the world comes to you.” “Now don’t you be impertinent,” he warned me, but, I don’t know why, I no longer feel at all afraid of his fists, and I went on speaking, the words positively flew out of me: “Obtain for me at once some exciting activity. Actually my view is this: all activity is exciting. I’ve already learned so much from you, Principal.” He said calmly: “You haven’t learned anything yet.” Then I took up the thread again and said: “God himself commands me to go out into life. But what is God? You are my God, Principal, if you allow me to go and earn money and respect.” He was silent for a while, then he said: “Get out of this office, this instant!” That annoyed me terribly. I shouted: “In you I see an outstanding person, but I’m wrong. You’re as common as the age you live in. I shall go out on the street and hold somebody up, I’m being forced to become a criminal.” I knew what peril I was in. The moment I said these words I leaped for the door and then shrieked in a rage: “Adieu, Principal!” and slid out through it, wonderfully nimbly. In the corridor I stopped and listened at the keyhole. Everything in the office was as quiet as a mouse. I went into the classroom and immersed myself in the book What Is the Aim of the Boys’ School?

  Our instruction has two sides, one theoretical and the other practical. But both sections seem to me still like a dream, like a fairy tale that is at once meaningless and rich in meaning. Learning by heart, that’s one of our main tasks. I learn by heart very easily, Kraus with great difficulty, therefore he’s always busy learning. The difficulties that he has to overcome are the secret of his industry, and the solution to it. He has a slow memory, and yet he impresses everything on his mind, even if it takes great effort. What he knows is then, so to speak, engraved in metal and he can never forget it again. In his case there can be no talk of forgetting. In a school where little is taught, Kraus is quite at home, therefore he’s completely at home in the Benjamenta Institute. One of the maxims of our school is: “A little, but thoroughly.” Well, now, Kraus stands firm on this principle, with the somewhat thick skull that is his in the world. To learn a little! The same thing over and over! Gradually I too am beginning to understand what a large world is hidden behind these words. To imprint something firmly, firmly on one’s mind! I understand how important that is above all things, how good and how dignified it is. The practical or physical part of our instruction is a kind of perpetually repeated gymnastics or dancing, or whatever you want to call it. The salutation, the entrance into a room, behavior toward women or whatever, is practiced, and the practice is very long drawn out, often boring, but here too, as I now observe, and feel, there lies a deeply hidden meaning. We pupils are to be trained and shaped, as I observe, not stuffed with sciences. We are educated by being compelled to learn exactly the character of our own soul and body. We are given clearly to understand that mere discipline and sacrifice are educative, and that more blessings and more genuine knowledge are to be found in a very simple, as it were stupid, exercise than in the learning of a variety of ideas and meanings. We grasp one thing after another, and when we have grasped a thing, it is as if it possessed us. Not we possess it, but the opposite:
whatever we have apparently acquired rules over us then. It is impressed upon us that a beneficent effect is to be had from acquiring a little that is firm and definite, that is to say, from growing accustomed and shaping oneself to laws and commands that prescribe a strict external discipline. Perhaps we’re being stupefied, certainly we’re being made small. But that doesn’t make us timid, not at all. We pupils all know, one as well as the next, that timidity is a punishable offense. Whoever stutters and shows fear is exposed to the scorn of our Fräulein, but we must be small, and we must know, know precisely, that we are nothing big. The law which commands, the discipline which compels, and the many unmerciful rules which give us a direction and give us good taste: that is the big thing, not us pupils. Well, everyone feels this, even I do, that we are small, poor dependent dwarfs, obliged to be continuously obedient. And so that’s how we behave: humbly, but with the utmost confidence. We are all, without exception, a little energetic, for the smallness and deprivation which are our conditions cause us to believe firmly in the few achievements that we have made. Our belief in ourselves is our modesty. If we didn’t believe in anything, we wouldn’t know how little we are. Nonetheless, we small young people are something. We may not be extravagant, we may not have imaginings, it is forbidden for us to look about us, and this makes us satisfied and makes us useful for any quick task. We know the world very badly, but we shall come to know it, for we shall be exposed to life and its storms. The Benjamenta school is the antechamber to the drawing rooms and palatial halls of life at large. Here we learn to feel respect, and to act as all those must act who have something to look up to. I, for one, am a little above all this, which is good, because all these impressions are so much the better for me. Precisely I have need to learn to feel esteem and respect for the objects of the world, for where would I end up if I was disrespectful to old age, if I denied God, mocked laws, and was allowed to stick my juvenile nose into everything sublime, important, and big? In my view, the present young generation is sick for precisely this reason, bellowing hell and blue murder and then meowing for daddy and mummy when they’re obliged to give in a little to duties and commandments and limitations. No, no, here the Benjamentas are my dear shining lodestars, the brother as well as the Fräulein, his sister. I will think of them as long as I live.