Old Masters (19 page)

state, by now mutilated beyond recognition,
politicians who abused their office, who made common cause with crime. When you open your paper you think you are living in a state where political atrocities and political criminality have become a daily occurrence. Initially I told myself I would not let myself get worked up because this state today is thoroughly and utterly beyond discussion, but all of a sudden I find it quite impossible
not
to get worked up in this horrid and daily more horrendous state; when you open your paper in the morning you quite automatically get worked up about the atrocities and the crimes of our politicians. Quite automatically you gain the impression that all politicians are criminal types and are fundamentally criminal and a pack of swine, Reger said. In consequence I have lately broken myself of the habit of reading the paper in the morning, as had been my custom for decades, it is enough for me to open it in the afternoon. If a newspaper reader opens his paper first thing in the morning he makes himself sick first thing in the morning and for the rest of the day and even for the subsequent night, Reger said, because he is confronted with an ever bigger political scandal, with ever bigger political corruption, Reger said. The newspaper reader in this country has for years read nothing but scandal in his paper, on the first three pages the political scandal and on the following pages the rest; but whatever he does all he reads about is scandal because the Austrian papers now write about nothing but scandal and corruption, about nothing else. The Austrian papers have reached such a low level that this too is a scandal, Reger said, there are no lower or baser or more repugnant papers in the world than the Austrian papers, but these Austrian papers are of necessity so hideous and so base because Austrian society, above all Austrian political society, and this state are all so hideous and so base. Never before has there been such a hideous or base society in this country with such a hideous and base state, Reger said, but no one in this state and in this country regards this as a disgrace, no one really rebels against it, Reger said. Austrians have always accepted everything, no matter what it was, even though it was the worst atrocity and the greatest infamy, even if it was the most monstrous of all monstrosities, Reger said. Austrians are anything but revolutionaries because they are no fanatics of truth at all, Austrians have for centuries lived with lies and got used to it, Reger said, Austrians have for centuries been wedded to lies, to every lie, Reger said, but most deeply and most of all to the lies of the state. Austrians live their common and base Austrian lives with the lies of the state, without giving them another thought, Reger said, that is what is so repulsive about them. Your so-called charming Austrian is an insidious and opportunist setter of traps, Reger said, who always and everywhere sets his opportunist traps, the so-called charming Austrian is a master of the most infamous infamy, beneath his so-called charm he is the most infamous and shameless and ruthless person and
for this very reason
the most mendacious, Reger said. Although I have been a fanatical reader of newspapers all my life, Reger said, I now find it well-nigh unbearable to open a paper because they are only full of scandals. But then the papers reflect the society they report on, Reger said. You may search for a whole year and you will not find a single intelligent sentence in any of these filthy rags, Reger said. But why am I telling you all this when you are just as familiar with everything Austrian, Reger said. I woke up this morning and thought of the ministerial scandal and I cannot get that ministerial scandal out of my mind, that is the tragedy of my mind, Reger said, that I cannot get these scandals, and above all these political scandals, out of my mind, these scandals are eating ever more deeply into my mind, that is the tragedy. I tell myself that I must get all these scandals and atrocities out of my mind and yet these atrocities and scandals are eating ever more deeply into my mind. But of course I find it soothing to talk to you about all these things and more especially about these political atrocities and scandals, every morning I think how fortunate for me to have the Ambassador in order to be able to talk to you and of course not only about the scandals and the atrocities, because naturally there are other things as well, more cheerful ones, such as music, Reger said. So long as I still feel like talking about the
Tempest Sonata
or about the Art of the Fugue I am not giving up, Reger said. Music saves me time and again, the fact that music is still alive within me, and it still is as alive in me as on the day I was born, Reger said. To be saved anew by music every morning, from all the atrocities and hideousnesses, he said, that is it; to be made once more into a thinking and feeling individual by music, you understand, he said. Ah yes, Reger said, even if we curse it at times, even if at times it seems to us entirely superfluous and even if we have to say it is not worth anything, this art, yet when we look on these pictures here, these so-called old masters, though they have very often, and increasingly s6 over the years, seemed pointless and useless, nothing but helpless attempts to establish themselves artistically on the surface of the earth, it is nothing else but just this cursed and damned and often (to the point of vomiting) revolting and embarrassing art that saves such as ourselves, Reger said. The Austrian has always been a clever person, Reger said, and he is profoundly aware of being that. That is the cause of all his distastefulness, of his weakness of character, because more than from any other distastefulness the Austrian suffers from a weak character. But that also makes him a lot more interesting than all others, Reger said. The Austrian is actually the most interesting type of all European types, because he has everything of every other European type plus his own weakness of character on top. That is what is so fascinating about the Austrian, Reger said, that all the qualities of all the others are present in him from birth and his own weakness of character on top. If we spend all our lives in Austria we do not see the Austrian as he really is, but if, after a prolonged absence such as mine in London, we return to Austria we see him clearly and he cannot pretend to us. The Austrian is a genius at pretending, the greatest genius at play-acting altogether, Reger said, he pretends to be everything without ever being any of it in fact, that is his most prominent characteristic. The Austrian is popular throughout the world, at least he is to this day, and the whole world has, so to speak, always been fooled simply because he is
the most interesting European type,
yet at the same time he is always also
the most dangerous.
The Austrian is very probably the most dangerous type altogether, more dangerous than the German, more dangerous than any other European, the Austrian is definitely the most dangerous political type, this has been demonstrated by history, and time and again this has brought the greatest misfortune upon Europe and indeed very often upon the whole world. No matter how interesting or unique we may find the Austrian, who invariably is a common Nazi or a stupid Catholic, we must not allow him to seize the political rudder, Reger said, because an Austrian at the rudder always and inescapably steers everything into a total abyss. A sleepless night and exasperation over these everlasting political scandals, Reger then said. Yes, I thought first thing in the morning, you will be meeting Atzbacher at the Kunsthistorisches Museum to put a proposal to him, and you know perfectly well that you will be putting a totally nonsensical proposal to him, but you will put the proposal to him. A ludicrous matter and nevertheless a monstrous one, Reger said. For two months after the death of his wife Reger did not leave his flat on the Singerstrasse and for six months after the death of his wife he did not meet a single person. For these six months he was being looked after by his
vulgar and dreadful
housekeeper and not once did he go to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, where for decades he had been every other day with his wife, I now reflect. His housekeeper cooked for him and washed his clothes, even though doing
everything in an outrageously slovenly manner,
Reger said time and again, but at least he did not go to seed completely. A person suddenly left alone goes to seed very rapidly, Reger himself said, for months I ate nothing but semolina pudding, Reger said, because with my unrepaired dentures I could no longer eat any meat or even any vegetables. The Singerstrasse flat has become silent as the grave and empty, this was Reger's own description of the state of affairs when I met him at the Ambassador for the first time after his wife's death, haggard, pale, supporting himself on his stick nearly all the time, his laces undone and his winter longjohns slipping out from his trouser legs. We do not wish to go on living when we have lost the person closest to us, he said to me at the Ambassador then, but we have to go on living, we do not kill ourselves because we are too cowardly for that, we promise by the open grave that we shall soon follow and then, six months later, we are still alive and we have a horror of ourselves, Reger said to me at the Ambassador then. His wife was eighty-seven, but she could certainly have lived well into her hundreds had she not had that fall, Reger said to me at the Ambassador then. The city of Vienna and the Austrian state and the Catholic Church, Reger said to me at the Ambassador then, are responsible for her death, because if the city of Vienna, which owns the approach to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, had gritted the approach to the Kunsthistorisches Museum my wife would not have had a fall, and if the Kunsthistorisches Museum, which belongs to the state, had notified the ambulance service at once and not half an hour later, my wife would have got to the Merciful Brethren Hospital sooner than an hour after her fall, or if the surgeons at the Merciful Brethren Hospital, which belongs to the Catholic Church, had not bungled the operation, my wife would not have died, Reger said to me at the Ambassador then. The city of Vienna and the Austrian state and the Catholic Church are responsible for the death of my wife, Reger said at the Ambassador, I now reflected while sitting next to him on the Bordone Room settee. The city of Vienna fails to grit the approach to the Kunsthistorisches Museum on a day when it is icy and the Kunsthistorisches Museum notifies the ambulance service only after repeated requests and finally the surgeons at the Merciful Brethren Hospital bungle the operation and in the end my wife is dead, Reger said at the Ambassador. We lose the person we have loved most devotedly of all people solely through the negligence of the city of Vienna and through the negligence of the Austrian state and through the negligence of the Catholic Church, Reger said at the Ambassador then. We lose the person most important to us because the city and the state and the Church have acted negligently, Reger said at the Ambassador then. The person with whom we have shared our life for nearly forty years, in the most natural way and with respect and love, dies because the city and the state and the Church have acted negligently and infamously, Reger said at the Ambassador then. We are suddenly left alone by the one person whom, basically, we had, because the city and the state and the Church have acted thoughtlessly and irresponsibly, Reger said at the Ambassador then. All of a sudden we are cut off from the person to whom we owe
basically everything
and who in fact gave us everything, Reger said at the Ambassador then. We are suddenly alone in our flat without the person who has kept us alive with the greatest care for some decades, simply because city and state and Catholic Church have committed the crime of negligence, Reger said at the Ambassador then. We stand by the open grave of the person whom we have never been able to imagine living without, Reger said at the Ambassador then. The city of Vienna and the Austrian state and the Catholic Church are responsible for my being alone now and for my having to be alone as long as I live, Reger said at the Ambassador then. The person who had always been in good health and who had every conceivable virtue of an intelligent
and
female person and who in fact had been the most loving person in my life dies and leaves me only because the city of Vienna does not grit the approach to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, only because the Kunsthistorisches Museum, which belongs to the state, does not notify the ambulance service in time and because the surgeons at the Merciful Brethren Hospital bungle the operation, Reger said at the Ambassador then. My wife might have lived into her hundreds, I am convinced of it, if the city of Vienna had gritted the approach to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Reger said at the Ambassador then. And she would certainly still be alive if the Kunsthistorisches Museum had notified the ambulance service in time and if the surgeons at the Merciful Brethren Hospital had not bungled the operation. Strictly speaking I should not have entered the Kunsthistorisches Museum again, Reger said, having entered it again seven months after the death of his wife. Now the approach to the Kunsthistorisches Museum is gritted, now that my wife is dead, Reger said. And why did they have to take my wife to the Merciful Brethren Hospital, of all places, to a hospital of which I have never heard a good word, Reger said. All these hospitals with the word
merciful
in their title are utterly distasteful to me, Reger said. The word
merciful
is abused more than almost any other word, Reger said. The merciful hospitals are the most merciless I know, Reger said, in them, as a rule, reigns only avarice and a lack of skill, quite apart from that utterly infamous and base sham-religiosity, Reger said at the Ambassador then. Now I have only the Ambassador left, Reger said at the Ambassador then, this corner to which I have become used over the decades. I have two locations to which I can escape when I no longer know where to turn, Reger said at the Ambassador then, this corner here at the Ambassador and the settee at the Kunsthistorisches Museum. But sitting all alone in this corner here at the Ambassador is also terrible, Reger said at the Ambassador then. Sitting here with my wife used to be one of my favourite occupations, not sitting here on my own, not here on my own, my dear Atzbacher, Reger said at the Ambassador then, and sitting on my own on the Bordone Room settee at the Kunsthistorisches Museum is also terrible, when I have sat on it with my wife for over three decades. When I walk through the city of Vienna I keep thinking that the city of Vienna is responsible for the death of my wife and that the Austrian state is responsible for her death and that the Catholic Church is responsible for her death, no matter where I go, I cannot get this idea out of my mind, Reger said. A crime has been committed against me, a municipal-governmental-Catholic-ecclesiastical atrocity that I can do nothing about, that is the worst of it, Reger said. Basically, Reger said at the Ambassador then, I also died at the moment my wife died. The truth is that I feel like a dead man, like a dead man who has to go on living. That is my problem, Reger said at the Ambassador then. The flat is empty and deserted, Reger said several times at the Ambassador then. In all those twenty years I have only twice been to the Regers' flat on the Singerstrasse, a ten- or twelveroom flat in a building of the turn of the century, which now, after the death of Reger's wife, belongs to Reger. Filled with the furniture of his wife's family, the Regers' flat on the Singerstrasse is a fine example of a so-called