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Madensky Square - pp 177-178
We went then to the roundabouts. He chose to ride not on a dappled horse - I had noticed already his dislike of horses -but on a swan. He enjoyed it, but he didn't want to go round again. It was an experience complete in itself.
Then came the Wurschtlmann. He's so famous the Prater is named for him and you can see why. A hideous rubber man with a red nose who, for a few kreutzer one can thump and pound and wallop to one's heart's content, knowing that he will right himself undamaged and come up for more. Give him a name - that of your mean-minded boss, your bullying commanding officer - and you can punch him insensible and walk away, purged.
'Would you like to have a go, Sigismund?'
Even before he shook his head I saw him instinctively shield his hands, hiding them behind his back - and that was the first time I remembered the concert.
In the end, though, the Prater is about the ferris wheel whose fame has spread throughout the Empire. It towers over everything else, its carriages take you a hundred metres into the sky. To be up there and look down on the city is to ride with the gods.
So I asked him: 'What about the giant wheel? Would you like to go on it ?'
His hand tightened in mine. A tremor passed over his face. She had not been frightened even at six years old, but the boy was scared.
'The view is very beautiful from the top. You can see all Vienna.'
He stood still in the middle of the path. He tilted his head and gave a small sniff.
'I want very much to be brave,' he said in his low, cracked voice. 'I very much want it.'
And suddenly it all dissolved - my long antagonism, my restraint, the resentment that I felt at being asked for what belonged only to my daughter. I saw him sitting beside his dead mother in the Polish forest, waiting for her to wake … Saw him wobbling on the Encyclopedia of Art, playing and playing because he could no longer talk. I remembered the silent patience with which he'd endured his uncle's bullying, saw the graze on his forehead of which he'd said no word.
And I knelt beside him and took him in my arms.
'You are brave, Sigi. You're very brave, my darling,' I said - and kissed him.
So now I can tell you this. They are entirely exact descriptions of what happens, those ones in the fairy tales which tell you what occurs when you kiss an ugly frog, a hairy beast, with proper love.Sigi didn't kiss me back or cling to me. He just straightened his shoulders and then in a calm, almost matter-of-fact voice, he said: 'Now we will go up,' - and then led me to the brightly painted carriages swaying high above our heads.
Then came the Wurschtlmann. He's so famous the Prater is named for him and you can see why. A hideous rubber man with a red nose who, for a few kreutzer one can thump and pound and wallop to one's heart's content, knowing that he will right himself undamaged and come up for more. Give him a name - that of your mean-minded boss, your bullying commanding officer - and you can punch him insensible and walk away, purged.
'Would you like to have a go, Sigismund?'
Even before he shook his head I saw him instinctively shield his hands, hiding them behind his back - and that was the first time I remembered the concert.
In the end, though, the Prater is about the ferris wheel whose fame has spread throughout the Empire. It towers over everything else, its carriages take you a hundred metres into the sky. To be up there and look down on the city is to ride with the gods.
So I asked him: 'What about the giant wheel? Would you like to go on it ?'
His hand tightened in mine. A tremor passed over his face. She had not been frightened even at six years old, but the boy was scared.
'The view is very beautiful from the top. You can see all Vienna.'
He stood still in the middle of the path. He tilted his head and gave a small sniff.
'I want very much to be brave,' he said in his low, cracked voice. 'I very much want it.'
And suddenly it all dissolved - my long antagonism, my restraint, the resentment that I felt at being asked for what belonged only to my daughter. I saw him sitting beside his dead mother in the Polish forest, waiting for her to wake … Saw him wobbling on the Encyclopedia of Art, playing and playing because he could no longer talk. I remembered the silent patience with which he'd endured his uncle's bullying, saw the graze on his forehead of which he'd said no word.
And I knelt beside him and took him in my arms.
'You are brave, Sigi. You're very brave, my darling,' I said - and kissed him.
So now I can tell you this. They are entirely exact descriptions of what happens, those ones in the fairy tales which tell you what occurs when you kiss an ugly frog, a hairy beast, with proper love.Sigi didn't kiss me back or cling to me. He just straightened his shoulders and then in a calm, almost matter-of-fact voice, he said: 'Now we will go up,' - and then led me to the brightly painted carriages swaying high above our heads.
Near fragment in time
Hilde Spiel bedarf keiner nachrühmenden Erläuterungen. Als engagierte Kritikerin, Essayistin, Herausgeberin, Übersetzerin, auch als Autorin des ausgezeichneten diskursiven Emigrantenromans "Lisas Zimmer" ist sie erfolgreich präsent. Schon damals, in den frühen Dreißigerjahren, als sportlich-attraktive Absolventin der "Schwarzwaldschule" zu freiem Denken erzogen, galt sie im "Herrenhof" als vielversprechende Literaturdebütantin. Dankenswerter Weise gab sie mir briefliche Auskunft über ihre Jugendjahre im "Herrenhof":
"... Ich bin etwa mit siebzehn oder achtzehn Jahren ins "Herrenhof" gekommen, das ja im selben Häuserblock lag, an dessen Rückseite, in der Wallnerstraße Nr. 9, auf den oberen Stockwerken die Schwarzwaldschule untergebracht war. Wahrscheinlich kam ich durch den Fritz Thorn und den Torberg hin, die ich beide, Torberg noch als Kantor [Sein ursprünglicher Name lautete Kantor. Aus dessen zweiter Silbe und Berg, dem Mädchennamen seiner Mutter, entstand der nordischanmutende Name des Schriftstellers Torberg.], als Wasserballer im Dianabad, durch die damalige Meisterschwimmerin Maria Puchberger, jetzige Baronin Ditfurth, ein oder zwei Jahre früher kennengelernt hatte. Im "Herrenhof", das sehr bald zu einer zweiten Heimat wurde und in dem ich sehr häufig nachmittags oder abends saß, wenn ich nicht Ski fuhr oder im Schwimmklub trainierte, das ich vor allem (und zwar im zweiten, großen Saal) mit Thorn, mit Torberg, wann immer er in Wie war, mit Ernst Stern, dem Zeichner, Ringer und Privatphilosophen, mit Ernst Polak, der - obwohl wesentlich älter - gleich mir bei Moritz Schlick studierte, und mit Peter Hammerschlag, der mir jede Woche einen Schilling meines fünf Schilling betragenden Taschengeldes abnahm, als Tribut an seine verspätete Peter Altenberg-Existenz: Wie P.A. hatte er begütete Eltern.
pp 128-137 from Veruntreute Geschichte. Die Wiener Salons und Literatencafés by
"... Ich bin etwa mit siebzehn oder achtzehn Jahren ins "Herrenhof" gekommen, das ja im selben Häuserblock lag, an dessen Rückseite, in der Wallnerstraße Nr. 9, auf den oberen Stockwerken die Schwarzwaldschule untergebracht war. Wahrscheinlich kam ich durch den Fritz Thorn und den Torberg hin, die ich beide, Torberg noch als Kantor [Sein ursprünglicher Name lautete Kantor. Aus dessen zweiter Silbe und Berg, dem Mädchennamen seiner Mutter, entstand der nordischanmutende Name des Schriftstellers Torberg.], als Wasserballer im Dianabad, durch die damalige Meisterschwimmerin Maria Puchberger, jetzige Baronin Ditfurth, ein oder zwei Jahre früher kennengelernt hatte. Im "Herrenhof", das sehr bald zu einer zweiten Heimat wurde und in dem ich sehr häufig nachmittags oder abends saß, wenn ich nicht Ski fuhr oder im Schwimmklub trainierte, das ich vor allem (und zwar im zweiten, großen Saal) mit Thorn, mit Torberg, wann immer er in Wie war, mit Ernst Stern, dem Zeichner, Ringer und Privatphilosophen, mit Ernst Polak, der - obwohl wesentlich älter - gleich mir bei Moritz Schlick studierte, und mit Peter Hammerschlag, der mir jede Woche einen Schilling meines fünf Schilling betragenden Taschengeldes abnahm, als Tribut an seine verspätete Peter Altenberg-Existenz: Wie P.A. hatte er begütete Eltern.
Near fragment in space
Eigentlich ist es ein freundlicher Tag. Im Prater blühn wieder die Bäume, blau ist der Himmel, locker gesprenkelt mit flauschigen Wolkenschäfchen. Ein Duft von Mandeln und Zuckerwatte lieht in der Luft. Und das muntere Pfeifen der Liliputbahn.
pp 236 from Der Fall des Lemming by