Dog Years (75 page)
Authors: Gunter Grass
CHORUS:
Don't turn around,
the Grinder's around.
A BOY:
Anything else in common with the builder of the Reichsautobahn?
CHORUS:
Don't go to the woods,
in the woods are woods.
He who goes through the woods,
looking for trees.
seek him not in the woods.
A BOY:
We wish to know whether the topic under discussion, Walter Matern, alias the Grinder, has other points in common with Adolf Hitler, topic of a previous discussion.
CHORUS:
Have no fear.
fear smells of fear,
He who smells of fear
will be smelled
by heroes who smell like heroes.
A BOY:
The topic under discussion is moistening his lips.
CHORUS:
Don't drink of the sea,
it whets the appetite.
If you drink of the sea
you'll thirst eternally
for ocean.
A BOY:
Dynamic compulsory discussion stands starkly menacing, without smoke trailer, on the horizon.
CHORUS:
Don't build a home
or you'll be at home.
If you're at home,
you'll expect
late visitors and open up.
A BOY:
Walli S., our assistant, has already begun to remove documents from the document case: postcards, blood spots, certificates, specimens of feces, affidavits, neckties, letters. . .
CHORUS:
Don't write letters,
letters are filed away.
When you sign a letter,
you're signing
what you were yesterday.
A BOY:
He who always stood central, whose phenotypes are the bounceback man and the Grinder, whose posthumous papers we will examine in his lifetime, thinks he still stands central.
CHORUS:
Don't stand in the light,
the light can't see you.
TWO BOYS:
Don't have courage,
courage takes courage.
TWO GIRLS:
Don't sing in the fire,
nobody sings in the fire.
TWO BOYS:
Don't lapse into silence,
or you'll break silence.
CHORUS:
Don't turn around,
the Grinder's around.
MATERN:
To further your search for clarity, I'll talk again. What is it you wish to know, hear, nibble on?
A BOY:
Facts. Characteristics in common with that other Ram-born topic. We know you grind your teeth.
CHORUS:
Don't turn around.
MATERN:
Always glad to oblige: this dog. Like me, Hitler was fond of black-haired German shepherds. And the black shepherd Harras, who belonged to a carpenter. . .
DISCUSSION LEADER:
This definitely confirms the black-haired shepherd as our fixed point. Do any of our members, nevertheless and for safety's sake, wish to ask further questions?
(
Walli S. notes and underlines the "fixed point.")
A BOY:
The fixed point, German shepherd, should at least be tested from the erotic standpoint.
A BOY:
Member No. twenty-eight is surely referring to the sexual implications of the fixed point.
DISCUSSION LEADER:
The supplementary exploratory question is approved. Go ahead.
A BOY:
With what famous women have you, or would you like to have had, sexual intercourse?
MATERN:
In the year 1806 with Queen Louise of Prussia, twice in quick succession. She was in flight from Napoleon at the time and spent the night with me in my father's windmill, which was guarded by a black shepherd by the name of Perkun.
A BOY:
The queen in question is largely unknown to the members of this discussion club. . .
DISCUSSION LEADER:
Nevertheless, Walli S., please make a note of the watchdog Perkun, but add the word "legendary" with a question mark.
MATERN:
Furthermore, from late summer '38 to spring '39, I intercoursed fairly regularly with the Virgin Mary.
A BOY:
Any good Catholic can re-enact fictitious intercourse with the Virgin Mary; moreover, the same re-enaction is open to every so-called unbeliever.
MATERN:
Just the same, it was she who persuaded me to poison the black shepherd Harras with rat poison, because this Harras. . .
DISCUSSION LEADER:
Very well, at the request of the topic under discussion please note in parentheses "Marianic influence" before the key phrase "Harras' dogdeath by rat poison."
A BOY:
We still need something more definite, something that isn't grounded in the irrational.
MATERN:
All right, here's your candy. I slept with Eva Braun at a time when she was already his mistress.
A BOY:
Please describe the coitus in every detail.
MATERN:
A gentleman doesn't talk about his adventures in bed.
A BOY:
The objection is unwarranted. After all, this is an open forum.
A GIRL:
The topic's obscene secretiveness is an insult to the female members of this discussion club.
CHORUS:
The discussion soon will be
made compulsory.
DISCUSSION LEADER:
Objection from the chair. The topic under discussion has adequately answered the question about coitus with celebrated women. After legendary intercourse with the here largely unknown Queen Louise of Prussia, after fictitious intercourse with the Virgin Mary, he has admitted to coitus with Fräulein Eva Braun. Consequently questions concerning the details of this coitus are superfluous; at most the topic under discussion might be asked whether the sexual act between the sexual subjects Matern and Braun was or was not performed in the presence of spectators.
A BOY:
For instance: was the builder of the Reichsautobahn present?
MATERN:
He and his black and favorite dog Prinz, as well as the Führerphotographer Hoffmann.
DISCUSSION LEADER:
The exploratory question has been an swered. The answer has confirmed the sexual implications of the "black-haired shepherd dog," already recognized as a fixed point of discussion. We can manage without the photographer, I should think.
(Walli S. makes a note.)
Before we proceed to discuss the ownership status of the dog here present, who not only functions as our topic's fixed point but is actually present at his feet, the topic under discussion is authorized to ask the members of our discussion club a question.
MATERN:
What is all this? Why am I standing here in Johannes Gutenberg's place? How can you call this public third degree a public discussion? How can you say it's dynamic when I, talented and trained in dynamic striding, have to stand still between columns? For I, as actor and phenotype, as Karl Moor and Franz Moor: "Slavish wisdom, slavish fears!" hunger for pacings back and forth, for entrances sudden and unexpected, for phrases to hurl across footlights, exits that give promise of new and terrible entrances: "But soon I will come among you and hold terrible muster." -- Instead of all this, statics and question games. By what right are these know-it-all snot-noses questioning me? Or, to put it more politely: What is the purpose of this discussion?
DISCUSSION LEADER:
The last question is in order.
A BOY:
Through discussion we inform ourselves.
A BOY:
Public discussion plays a legitimate role in every democracy.
A BOY:
Lest there be any misunderstanding, I wish to point out that public discussion, precisely because it is carried on in public, differs fundamentally from the Catholic institution of confession.
A BOY:
Nor is there any justification for analogies between our efforts and the so-called public confessions of countries under Communist rule.
A BOY:
Neither in the secular nor in the religious sense does democratic discussion culminate in absolution; it ends without commitment. Or it might be more accurate to say that true discussion doesn't end at all, for after every open forum we discuss our findings in small groups, and at the same time cast about for interesting topics to discuss in future open forums.
A BOY:
When we have finished with topic Walter Matern, for example, we plan to discuss the denominational school, or we shall take up the question: Have savings encouraged by fiscal policy become of interest again?
A BOY:
We recognize no taboos.
A BOY:
Recently we discussed the philosopher Martin Heidegger, the man and his work. I feel justified in saying that this topic of discussion holds no further enigmas for us.
CHORUS:
Stockingcap croaks
metaphysical jokes.
A BOY:
When you come right down to it, problems solve themselves. All you need is a little patience. Take the Jewish question. Such a thing could never happen in our generation. We'd have gone on discussing with the Jews until they emigrated of their own free will and conviction. We despise all violence. Even when we engage in compulsory discussion, the conclusion is in no way binding on the topic of compulsory discussion: when the discussion is over, he's perfectly free to hang himself or to drink beer if he prefers. We're living in a democracy after all.
A BOY:
We live for discussion.
A BOY:
In the beginning was discussion.
A BOY:
We discuss in order not to have to soliloquize.
A BOY:
For here and here alone are our social ties forged. Here no one is lonely.
A BOY:
Neither class struggle ideology nor bourgeois political economy can replace the stratification mechanism of applied sociology, namely, free discussion.
A BOY:
After all, the technical efficiency of our life apparatus depends on great social organizations such as the World League of Free and Discussion-welcoming Discussion Groups.
A BOY:
To discuss is to master the problems of existence.
A BOY:
Modern sociology has demonstrated that in a modern mass state free discussion alone offers the possibility of developing personalities mature enough for discussion.
CHORUS:
We are one big happy public international independent dynamic discussion family.
TWO BOYS:
If we didn't welcome discussion, there would be no democracy, no freedom, and consequently no life in a free democratic mass society.
A BOY:
Let us sum up:
(All stand up.)
We have been asked by the topic under discussion why we discuss. Our answer is: We discuss in order to prove the existence of the topic under discussion; if we were silent, Walter Matern, the topic under discussion, would cease to exist!
CHORUS:
Therefore we all agree: without us Matern would not be!
(Willi S. writes on the blackboard.)
DISCUSSION LEADER:
The topic's question has been answered. And now we ask: Do you wish to ask a supplementary question?
MATERN:
Don't mind me. I'm beginning to catch on, and I agree to play along -- without reservation.
DISCUSSION LEADER:
In that case let's get back to the fixed point, the black shepherd, who has proved himself three times, the last time in his erotic significance.
MATERN
(with pathos):
If you want me, friends, to spill
my guts, hold out the basin!
I'll vomit up without restrain
peas spooned up dog years ago.
DISCUSSION LEADER:
We shall now proceed to clarify and discuss the ownership status of a black shepherd.