The Metamorphosis and Other Stories (20 page)

A slight obstacle to be sure, an obstacle growing slighter by the day. One has grown accustomed in this day and age to finding it strange to call attention to a hunger artist, and in accordance with this custom the verdict was carried against him. He might fast as well as only he could, and indeed he did, but nothing could save him, everyone passed him by. Just try to explain the art of fasting to someone! Without a feeling for it, one cannot be made to understand it. The colorful placards became dirty and illegible, they were torn down and no one thought to replace them; the little signboard tallying the number of days fasted, which was at first carefully altered each day, had long remained unchanged, for after the first few weeks the staff had already tired of even this small task, and so the hunger artist just fasted on as he had once dreamed of doing, and it was indeed no trouble for him, as he had always predicted, but no one counted the days, no one, not even the hunger artist himself, knew the extent of his achievement, and his spirits sank. And once in a while when a random passerby lingered, ridiculed the outdated number posted, and hinted at fraud, it was the stupidest lie in a sense, born of malice and brute indifference, for the hunger artist did not cheat; he worked with integrity, but the world cheated him of his reward.

However, many more days passed and that too came to an end. An overseer happened to notice the cage one day and asked the help why this perfectly useful cage with rotten straw in it was left unoccupied; no one knew the answer until someone, with the help of the signboard, recalled the hunger artist. They prodded the straw with sticks and found the hunger artist buried inside. "Are you still fasting?" asked the overseer. "When on earth do you plan on stopping?" "Forgive me, everyone," rasped the hunger artist; only the overseer with his ear pressed against the bars could understand him. "By all means," said the overseer, tapping his finger at the side of his forehead to indicate the hunger artist's condition to the others, "we forgive you." "I always wanted you to admire my fasting," said the hunger artist. "And so we do admire it," said the overseer accommodatingly. "But you shouldn't admire it," said the hunger artist. "So then we don't admire it," said the overseer, "but why should we not admire it?" "Because I must fast, I cannot do otherwise," answered the hunger artist. "What a character you are," said the overseer, "and why can't you do otherwise?" "Because," said the hunger artist, lifting his head a little and puckering his lips as if for a kiss, and he spoke directly into the overseer's ear so that nothing would be missed, "because I could never find food I liked. Had I found it, believe me, I would never have created such a ruckus and would have stuffed myself like you and everyone else." These were his last words, but in his glazing eyes there remained the firm if no longer proud conviction that he was still fasting.

"Now clear this out!" barked the overseer, and they buried the hunger artist together with his straw. Then they put a young panther into the cage. It was refreshing, even to the least sensitive, to see this wild creature leaping around the cage that had been dreary for so long. He wanted for nothing. The guards brought him the food he liked without hesitation; he did not appear to miss his freedom; his noble body, full to almost bursting with all he needed, also seemed to carry freedom with it; this freedom seemed to reside somewhere in his jaws, and the joy of life burned so fiercely in his throat that it was not easy for the onlookers to bear it. But they steeled themselves, surged around the cage, and wanted never to leave it.

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An Old Leaf

IT WOULD SEEM THAT THERE IS much about the defense of our fatherland that has been neglected. We have not been overly concerned about this until recently and have gone about our daily work, but lately certain events have caused us concern.

I have a shoemaker's workshop in the square in front of the imperial palace. Scarcely have I opened up shop at daybreak when I see armed men posted at the end of every street leading into the square. These, however, are not our soldiers but clearly nomads from the north. They have somehow, just how is inconceivable to me, penetrated the capital, although it is really quite a long distance from the border. In any event they are there, and every morning it seems that there are more of them.

As befits their nature, they camp out in the open because they loathe housing. They occupy themselves by sharpening swords, whittling arrows, practicing their horsemanship. This peaceful square, which has always been kept scrupulously dean, has been transformed by them into a veritable sty. We do, every now and then, dash out of our shops and clear away at least the worst of the trash, but this happens less and less frequently, as the effort is futile; besides, in doing this we risk being trampled by horses or lashed by whips.

Conversation with the nomads is impossible. They don't speak our language and in fact barely have one of their own. Among themselves they communicate much as jackdaws do; this jackdaw squawking constantly fills our ears. They neither understand nor have any desire to understand our way of life, our institutions, and so as a result even our sign language is willfully incomprehensible to them. You can dislocate your jaw and wrench your wrists out of joint and they still have not understood you, nor will they ever understand. They often grimace, then flash the whites of their eyes and foam at the mouth, but they don't actually mean anything by it; it's not even a threat, they just do it because that's their nature. They take whatever it is they need. You can't say that they employ force; when they grab at something, you simply stand aside and leave them to it.

From my own stores they have taken quite a lot. But I can hardly complain when I see, for example, how the butcher across the street fares. He's barely brought in his supplies when they're snatched away and the nomads are all over it. Even their horses feed on meat; a horseman and his horse frequently lie side by side, gnawing at the same piece of meat, one at either end. The butcher is afraid and does not dare stop his meat deliveries. We understand this, however, and we take up a collection to support him. Who knows what the nomads would be capable of if they didn't get the meat—for that matter, who knows what they're capable of even when they do get meat every day.

The other day the butcher thought he might at least spare himself the trouble of slaughtering, so he brought out a live ox in the morning. He must never be permitted to do this again. For a full hour, I lay flat on the floor at the very back of my workshop; I had covered myself with all my clothes, blankets, and pillows, just to drown out the horrifying braying of that ox; the nomads were leaping on it from all sides to rip off pieces of its warm flesh with their teeth. All had been quiet for a long time before I ventured out again. Like drunks around a wine cask, they were lying glutted around the remains of the ox.

It was just then that I thought I saw the Emperor himself in one of the palace windows; ordinarily he never enters these outer rooms but keeps strictly to the innermost garden; but at that moment he was standing, at least it seemed so to me, at one of the windows, gazing down, with head bowed, at the activity before his palace gates.

We all ask ourselves, What will happen? How long can we endure this burden and torment? The imperial palace has attracted the nomads, but it does not know how to drive them away again. The gates stay shut; the sentries, who before always marched in and out with pomp, now hide inside behind barred windows. The salvation of our fatherland is left to us craftsmen and tradespeople, but we are not equal to such a task, nor indeed have we ever claimed to be capable of it. This is a misunderstanding, and it is proving the ruin of us.

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A Message from the Emperor

THE EMPEROR, OR SO THEY SAY, HAS sent you—his single most contemptible subject, the minuscule shadow that has fled the farthest distance from the imperial sun—only to you has the Emperor sent a message from his deathbed. He has had the messenger kneel beside his bed and he has whispered the message to him; so important was this message that he has made him repeat it in his ear. He has confirmed the accuracy of the words with a nod of his head. And then, before all the spectators assembled to witness his death—every wall obstructing the view had been knocked down and on the free-standing, vaulted staircases, all the dignitaries of the empire were gathered in a circle—before them all, he has dispatched the messenger. The messenger sets off at once, a strong and tireless man; sometimes thrusting ahead with one arm, sometimes with the other, he beats a path through the crowd; where he meets resistance, he points to the sign of the sun on his breast, and he forges ahead with an ease that could be matched by no other. But the throng is so thick, there's no end to their dwellings. If only there were an open field before him, how fast he would fly; soon you would surely hear the glorious rapping of his knock on your door. But instead, how vain his efforts are; he is still only forcing his way through the chambers of the innermost palace; he will never reach the end of them, and even if he did he'd be no closer; he would have to fight his way down the steps, and even if he did he'd be no closer; he would still have to cross the courtyards, and after the courtyards the second, outer palace, and still more stairs and courtyards, and still another palace, and so on for thousands of years, and even if he did finally burst through the outermost gate—but that could never, ever happen—the empire's capital, the center of the world, flooded with the dregs of humanity, would still lie before him. There is no one who could force his way through here, least of all with a message from a dead man.—But you sit at your window and dream it up as evening falls.

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Before the Law

BEFORE THE LAW STANDS A DOOR-keeper. A man from the country comes to this doorkeeper and asks to be admitted to the Law. But the doorkeeper informs him that he cannot grant him admittance at this time. The man ponders this and then asks whether he will be admitted at some point in the future. "It is possible," says the doorkeeper, "but not at present." Because the gate stands open—as always—and the doorkeeper steps aside, the man stoops down to look through the gateway to the interior. On seeing this, the doorkeeper laughs and remarks: "If it's so enticing, then just try going in despite my interdiction. But take note: I am powerful. And I am only the lowliest doorkeeper. In hall after hall stand other doorkeepers, each more powerful than the last. The mere sight of the third doorkeeper is more than even I can endure." The man from the country never anticipated such difficulties. The Law, he thinks, should be accessible at all times and to everyone, but when he now takes a closer look at the doorkeeper in his fur coat, with his large, pointed nose and his long, skinny, black Tartar beard, he decides that he had better wait for permission to enter after all. The doorkeeper gives him a stool and allows him to set it to one side of the door. There he sits for days and years. He makes many attempts to be admitted and exhausts the doorkeeper with his pleas. The doorkeeper often conducts little interviews with him, asking him about his home and many other things, but the questions are put indifferently, much as high-ranking officials would put them, and he always concludes by repeating that he cannot yet admit him. The man, who came well equipped for his journey, uses everything he has, however valuable, for the purpose of bribing the doorkeeper. The doorkeeper accepts everything but says as he does so: "I'm only accepting this so you won't think there's something you haven't tried." Throughout the many years he observes the doorkeeper fixedly with almost no interruption. He forgets the other doorkeepers and this first one seems to him the sole obstacle between himself and the Law. He curses his miserable fate, loudly and recklessly in the early years, but later, as he grows old, he just grumbles to himself. He becomes childish, and since he has come to know even the fleas in the doorkeeper's fur collar during the long years of studying him, he begs the fleas to help him and to help win the doorkeeper over to his side. Eventually his eyesight begins to fail, and he does not know whether his eyes deceive him or whether it is really growing darker around him. But through the gloom he can now definitely make out a radiance that pours unendingly from the doorway of the Law. Now he no longer has much time to live. Before his death, all the experiences of these long years come together in his head to form one question that he has not yet put to the doorkeeper. He beckons to him because he can no longer raise his cramped and stiffening body. The doorkeeper has to bend down to him, since the difference in their heights has changed drastically, much to the man's disadvantage. "So, what is it that you still want to know?" asks the doorkeeper. "You are insatiable." "Surely everyone strives to reach the Law," says the man, "so how is it that no one but me has ever begged for admittance?" The doorkeeper recognizes that the man is near the end and, in order to penetrate his failing senses, shouts: "No one else could ever be granted admission here, as this gate was just for you. Now I am going to close it."

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Josephine the Singer, Or The Mouse People

OUR SINGER'S NAME IS JOSEPHINE. Anyone who has not heard her does not know the power of song. There is not one among us who is not swept away by her singing, and this is indeed high praise—higher still as we are not generally a music-loving people. Peace and quiet is the music most clear to us; we have a hard life and even on the occasions when we have tried to shake free from the cares of our daily life we still cannot raise ourselves up to something so lofty and remote from our routine lives as music. But we don't much mourn this, we never even get that far; we consider a certain pragmatic cunning, of which we are sorely in need, to be our greatest asset, and with a smile born of this cunning we are wont to console ourselves for all our woes even if—but it never happens—we were once to yearn for the kind of happiness such as music might provide. Josephine is the sole exception, she loves music and also knows how to give voice to it; she is the only one, and with her demise music will disappear—for who knows how long—from our lives.