The Death of Virgil

by Hermann Broch

  TO BE SURE, their progress was not therefore appreciably accelerated; once again they jerked forward only step by step, perhaps even more slowly than before, but not as was easily seen because of ill-meant obstacles but because just here, noticeable by the human murmur, by the human odor, by the growing dampness and closeness of the human warmth, the crowd had again increased and no doubt was continuing to increase. Although they had passed beyond hearing distance of Misery Street he still believed he could feel the carping, shrieking insults in his ears as before, indeed it almost seemed to him as if they had followed him like the Erinys, intent on harassing and torturing him as their natural prey, but not less intent, however, on uniting themselves with the rapidly-mounting mass-uproar springing up on all sides, which indicated a return to the vicinity of the imperial festival, so that the torture of the chase, paired with all this jubilation, with all this tumult of power and intoxication, should persist unabated ; and while he was taking in all of this, unable to repel the massed voices within and without, so unable to repel them that their raw torment almost caused him to faint, the light became similarly insistent, became so unbearably noisy, so unbearably crude, pressing so sharply through eyelids closed until now, that it forced them to blink open, their first unwilling hesitation growing quickly into wide-eyed terror: the infernal glare blazed toward him, blazing from the entrance of the fairly broad street through which, head to head, the human crowd surged forward, it gleamed out with terrifying crudity into his eyes, gleamed like some magic luminary which converted all that moved about there into a compulsorily automatic stream, one could almost think that even the litter swam with it, floated with it automatically, scarcely that it was being carried, and with every step, with every forward glide, the power of that mysterious, calamitous, senselessly-magnificent lure became more definitely felt, became more terrifying, more urgent, more intrusive, near and nearer the heart, growing, growing, growing, till at one stroke it revealed itself in that instant when the litter, shoved, pulled, carried high and swimmingly afloat, suddenly came to the entrance of the street; for here, quite abruptly, wreathed by fire, surrounded by tumult, stripped of every shield for light, of every shield for noise, in an unshielded dazzle of light and noise, gleaming and glittering, the imperial palace came to view, partly residence, partly fortress, arising vulcanically, infernally, glaringly, from the center of a shield-shaped, hunched, almost circular plaza, and this plaza was comprised of a single conglomerate flood of creaturekind, a massed, formed, forming, boiling human-humus, a flood of glossy eyes and glossy glances, all of them rigid in their ardor as though dispossessed of every other purport, directed toward the one and only goal, shining without a shadow, a human stream of fire avid to lick this fiery coast. Thus towered the citadel, irresistible and seductive, amid a surf of torches, the sole significant goal of the irresistibly attracted, crowding, snorting herd-mass, the longed-for goal of their excessive craving for direction, but for this very reason it was also the embodiment of a terrifying, gloom-showering, undiscoverably enigmatic power, incomprehensible for the individual animal, incomprehensible for the individual man, oh so incomprehensible that the question as to the meaning and source of the overpowering attraction imprisoned in the fiery house and shining out from it, throbbed in almost every one of them, in dread of an answer, in hope of an answer, and although no one was able to offer the true one, yet the most modest and inadequate gave such promise of being able to confirm their hope of salvaging consciousness, of salvaging humanity and the soul that it seemed worthy of proud utterance—; "Wine," the call went up, "Free wine," and the call "The Praetorians," and "The Caesar is to speak," and suddenly someone announced in a gasping voice: "They have started to distribute the money!" Thus the citadel cast its seductions upon them, thus they spurred on themselves and each other lest the great seduction should become dubious to them, and the fear of certain disappointment in wait for them at the long-desired, mysterious walls would not allow for the abatement of the wild lust, the great yearning for participation: cheap answers for so great a hope, cheap appeals, cheap prods, yet with each cry an impulse went through the mass, through the bodies, through the souls, a bullish obscene, irresistible impulse heading stolidly toward the common goal, a massed uproar and stampede heading, thrust after thrust, into a blazing nothing. And thickly massed the herd-smell smouldered above the heads, overhung by the smoke from the torches, the smoke a-glow, unbreathable, cough-provoking, stifling, thick brown swathes that piled up lazily tier on tier, left hanging in the motionless air; oh the heavy, indivisible, impenetrable layers of the infernal fog, a very ceiling of fog! Was there no longer a way out? was there no escape? oh, back! back to the ship, just to be allowed to die there! Where was the boy?! he should, he must lead the way back! With whom lay the decision?! Ah, wedged in the crowd and in the framework of its movement, there was nothing more to decide, and the voice that wanted to lift itself to decision could not get free of the breath; the voice remained blind! however the boy, as if he had heard the silent call, sent a smile upward, a smile from the eyes, full of serene apology, full of serene confidence, full of serene comfort in the knowledge that one was already released from every decision, yes, that the one made would be the right one, and this brought cheer notwithstanding all the frightfulness to come. On every side were the faces, one after another, usual faces with their usual though greatly exaggerated greed for food and drink, and this exaggeration, surmounting itself, had grown to an almost sinister ardor, to a brutal other-worldly possession that had left everything usual worlds behind and was conscious of nothing but the instant immediacy of the overpowering, gleaming goal, ardently longed for, ardently needed, ardently claimed, so that this very present might overshadow the cycle of their whole lives and lead on to participation, to participation in the power, the divinity, the expansive freedom and the eternity of the one who sat over there in the palace. Jerking, swaying, quivering, straining, exploding in gasps and groans, the frame-work moved forward, pushing to a certain extent against an elastic resistance that was undoubtedly there since it manifested itself in equally jerking counter-waves; and, in this forced-forcing to and fro, the cries of the stumbling, the down-trodden, the injured and perhaps even those of the dying became audible on every side, unnoticed or uncompassionately disdained, but again and again out-shouted by the jubilant hails, stifled by the furious uproar, shredded by the crackling of the flames. A momentous present was at stake, an endlessly amplified herd-present thrown up from the roaring of the herd, a present flung into uproar and at the same time flung out of the uproar itself, thrown up by the wit-lost, the soul-lost, the sense-lost, by those senseless because soul-lost, their senses so overemphasized in the mass that all things past and to come were engulfed by it, absorbing in itself as it did the uproar of all memory-depths, sheltering the remotest past and the remotest future in its tumult! Oh, greatness of human diversity, amplitude of human yearning! And floating in his awareness, floatingly borne aloft over the shouting heads, floatingly borne aloft over the festival fires of uproarious Brundisium, floating, held high in the undulant movement of the present, he experienced the boundless contraction of time's onrush in the cycle of immutability: everything was his, all was embodied in him, in an ever-present coexistence, just as it had always been from the beginning, and it was Troy that was blazing about him and it was the unquenchable conflagration of the universe, but he who was balanced above the burning, he was Anchises, blind and seeing at once, child and gray-beard at the same time by virtue of an unutterable recollection, borne on the shoulders of the son, identified with the universal present, borne on the shoulders of Atlas, on the shoulders of the Titan. And thus, step by step, he neared the palace.

  The immediate confines of the palace were barricaded by a police cordon; man after man armed with horizontally held lances bore the brunt of the surging crowd and offered it just that elastic resistance which had made itself felt, time after time, in the wavelike ebb which he had already noticed on the outski
rts of the plaza. Behind the cordon, however, the Praetorian cohort, whose arrival from Rome seemed to be considered an unusual event, had taken over the guard of honor and its presence there was nothing more than a bumptious, over-sized idleness in a warlike setting, with patrols and bivouac fires and far-flung canteen-tents from which emanated the hope and scent of free wine, deluding perhaps, yet nevertheless gladly given credence. The by-standers were able to get so far; but no farther. And here was the very spot where hope and disappointment counterbalanced one another, causing apprehensions and suspense like every choice between life and death, like each moment of life, since each moment contains both; and when the warm breath of the flames brushed over the crowd, ruffling the tall plumes on the helmets and throwing the gilded armor into high relief, when the hoarsely-overbearing "Get back!" of the police warded off the noisy onslaught, then the madness, darting up like a flame, became breathless, and the faces with parched lips and dangling tongues stared stolidly and covetously into that momentary flash of immortality; for time was balanced on a knife-edge.

  Naturally things were at their worst at the entrance to the palace because since Caesar's entrance the double line through which he had passed had disbanded and now there remained nothing to check the frenzied mob; completely devoid of order as if seized by a tornado, it whirled viscously toward this gateway which, outlined on both sides by a dense line of torches, resembled a fiery gullet, and into this they whirled, to be jammed and ejected again, yelling, dogged, brutal, trampling, frantic with desire; one could easier imagine oneself before the entrance to a circus than before an imperial mansion, so mad the bustle and brawling that ensued in contentions with the gatekeepers, so manifold the craftiness of impostors who tried to outwit and override the officials, so furious the shouts of those with permits whose rights were questioned, and of those who were kept waiting unduly; and when, at a word from the aged palace-servant whose usefulness only thus became apparent, the escort was admitted at once, the anger of those who, regardless of their standing, had been forced to comply to the entrance formalities rose intensely, yes even to the boiling point! they felt themselves made contemptible by this preference, they felt the contemptibleness of all human traits and all human institutions, they suddenly became conscious of all this because an exception had been made, could be made, for an individual, and it made no difference that it was only the exception due to one sick unto death, and to death itself. There was no one who might not come to despise his fellow man, and in the nameless and unutterable accumulation of contemptibleness, always disclosing and concealing itself anew, there dwelt man's knowledge of his own incapacity for humanity, his anxiety for a dignity with which he had been endowed but which he would never truly possess. Contempt warred with contempt within the narrow, hot funnel of the entrance. Small wonder then that having come within the courtyard, having escaped the greedy struggle, having escaped the infernal raw glare of the lights, he fancied himself free of the insult which had pursued him into the streets and on the plaza, and felt a relief similar to that which had been granted him by the passing of the seasickness, the same ease of mind despite the fact that this place which he now entered did not reveal itself as quietude; on the contrary the courtyard seemed fairly bursting with disorder; but after all it was only a seeming disorder; the imperial servants well used to such contingencies preserved strict discipline, and soon a major-domo provided with a guest list approached the litter to receive the newcomer, perfunctorily turning to the servant to let him whisper the name of the guest, perfunctorily taking in the name and checking it off the list, so without diffidence or regard for a famous poet that it seemed almost offensive, so offensive that he found it necessary to confirm and emphasize the servant's statement: "Yes, Publius Vergilius Maro, that is my name," he said, and became bitterly angry when this brought him only a curtly-polite but no less indifferent bow, and even the youth from whom he had expected support made no sound but instead obediently joined the procession, which at a nod from the major-domo now moved on toward the second peristyle. However, his anger did not last long, it vanished with the quietude that now actually embraced them as soon as the litter was borne into the almost complete silence of the garden-court with its drizzling fountains and deposited there in front of the megaron which Caesar had set aside as living quarters for his guests;, the slaves were lined up at the entrance to receive them and the hired porters were dismissed. For the youth also the procedure was the same; the cloak was taken from him and when smiling he made no motion to depart, the major-domo hectored him: "Why do you still hang around here? Make haste and be off!" The boy remained standing, affable and mischievous, and he smiled, perchance, at the rude way in which his leadership was acknowledged or, perchance, also because of the futility of an effort that could not remove him, either now or at any time. Nevertheless, was there any sense in the boy's remaining? Was his remaining here desirable? What could he, a tired invalid longing for solitude, do with the youth?! And yet, now this strange fear of being alone! this strange fear of ever having to lose the young guide! —: "My scribe," he said, and it was said almost against his will, as if something alien within himself had spoken out of him, alien and yet obscurely familiar, a will greater than one's own, a will-less will yet still compelling and overpowering: the night. A gentle forceful willing unfolded from the night. The garden-court was gentle, gentle the flowery breath, gentle the splashing of the two fountains, a dim, delicate, gently moist fragrance as of a spring night in autumn floated cool and fine-spun above the flower-beds, and music woven into it drifted back from the forefront of the palace like transparent strips of veiling, nearing at times, receding at others, veil after veil dotted with cymbal points, folded into the gray mist of voices on which the feasting yonder filtered beyond itself, over there a resounding, blaring light-clamor, here only a tone-mist drizzling into the immense spaces of night; the square patch of heaven stretched over the court now permitted the stars to be seen again, their breathing light once more visible though occasionally dimmed by the smoke-clouds trailing beneath them, but even these were permeated by the soft, drizzling tone-mist, sharing in the wandering-weaving misty murmur which impregnated the courtyard and shrouded each single thing, objects, odors and tones blended, mounting toward heaven in the stillness of the night; and yonder at the wall, its hard-fibered trunk faintly illumined, rearing up to the height of the roof, stiff and crabbed, black-fanned and repelling, stood a palm, even she pregnant with night.

  Oh stars, oh night! Oh, this was night, night at last! And it was the breath of sounding night, damp and deep and dark, that with aching chest he sucked deep within him. But he had tarried too long already, he must prepare himself to arise from the litter and he was rather vexed that the consideration of Caesar who had sent the irksome physician to him on the boat had not extended this far, and that evidently nobody realized how very frail he was; moreover they had already taken the chest with the Aeneid into the house and it behooved him to follow quickly. "Come," he called the boy to him as he sat up, "help me," and then leaning on the boy's shoulder he tried to mount the first steps of the staircase only to realize at once that his heart, his lungs and his knees were failing him and that he had overestimated himself: he had to be carried upstairs by two slaves. They went up three flights, the indifferent major-domo in front holding the guest scroll against his hip like a baton, to the rear the tramp, tramp, tramp of the slaves with the luggage; and when on reaching the top they entered the airy guest room which had been prepared, it was easy to see that it lay in the towerlike, southwest wing of the palace. Through the open arched windows well above the city's roofs a cool breeze was blowing, a cool remembrance of forgotten land and sea, seafast, land-fast, swept through the chamber, the candles, blown down obliquely, burned on the many-branched, flower-wreathed candelabrum in the center of the room, the wall-fountain let a fragile, fan-shaped veil of water purl coolly over its marble steps, the bed under the mosquito-netting was made up, and on the table beside it food an
d drink had been set out. Nothing was lacking, an armchair for contemplation stood near the bay-window and the commode stood in the corner of the room; the luggage was piled up in a way easy to handle, the manuscript-chest was pushed by special order near the bed, everything fitted in so neatly, so noiselessly, exactly as an invalid could have desired it, but still this was no longer the beneficence of Augustus, this was just the smooth planning of an irreproachable, fully equipped, royal household, there was no friendship in it. One must suffer it, one must accept it, sickness obliged one to do it, it was a compulsion of illness, a burdensome, bitterness-breeding compulsion, and withal this bitterness was not directed so much against the infirmity as against Augustus, apparently because he had the trick of always frustrating all gratitude. This bitterness toward Augustus—, had it not always been there from the beginning? In truth he had Augustus to thank for everything, peace and order and his own security, ho one else could have brought it to pass, and if in his stead Antonius had attained sovereignty, Rome would never have found the way back to peace, verily —and even so! yes, even so! still always mistrust for this man who had already passed into his forties without actually becoming older, unchanged these twenty-five years, with the same precocious sleekness and cunning now as then, this man who held the thread of politics in his well-skilled hands—, the bitter distrust for this over-aged youth to whom one owed everything, was it not thoroughly justified? he was distinguished only by his sleekness, sleek his beauty, sleek his intelligence, sleek his friendliness which one longed to accept as friendship but which was no true friendship since it always served selfish ends, and everyone was caught in his web, into his sleek, his shining web! And now again it had come to this, once more this hypocrisy of friendship—, why indeed had the hypocrite insisted on dragging an invalid in his train back to Italy? Ah, it had been better to die on the ship, better than here in the midst of this sleek imperial household, better than having to lie here where everything was all too perfect while yonder at the imperial feast with a blare of light and sound the imperial no-youth gave himself to the noisy celebration. As a roaring, far and strange, lewdly swelling and drooping, came the clamor thence, fouling the breath of night.