Anarchistbanjo's World

OD by Karl Hans Strobl and translated by Joe E Bandel

It doesn’t look very good, thinks Reinhold, that these two suspicious fellows have pockets full of stones—what does the cause of freedom have to do with such questionable characters and stones in their pockets? Yet they walk alongside the procession as if they belong, and Reinhold looks around somewhat embarrassed, wondering if anyone among the onlookers on the street is someone who knows him and wonders how the students came to have such followers. But Futterknecht pulls him along, and they stride quickly to arrive in time.

They arrive in time; those from the university haven’t yet set off; there’s still a dense throng crammed into the small square in front of the lecture hall entrance. Everyone wants the same thing, but there’s a lack of an organizing and guiding spirit, the final spark of a word. Even a professor is still speaking, urging patience, awaiting the further noble resolutions of the monarch.

“We’ve waited enough now,” shouts Futterknecht, “up to the country house!”

Now Reinhold no longer marches at the front; he has managed to slip away from Futterknecht and blend into the crowd. No, he doesn’t have to march at the front; it’s not necessary, and it’s even embarrassing to have all eyes fixed on him as if he were a leader, when he knows he’s just going along. Yes, to be a leader, he might have had to do things quite differently at home—not always standing stiffly, not letting all growth be crushed under the yoke of blind obedience. And as long as it was just words, it was a good and beautiful cause; the words were pure and grand, spreading shining wings. But now the words have descended into reality; it seems they’re on the march toward action, and they have pockets full of stones and suddenly look entirely different.

The people in the windows call and wave, and many stand along the houses, calling and waving; at the corner of Herrengasse, Reinhold suddenly spots Verwalter Ruf, his father’s steward. He stands with some suspicious characters, gesturing wildly with his hands, his face bright red from wine and shouting, and the others gesture and shout too, and perhaps they’re all a bit drunk together. But Reinhold doesn’t take the time to look closer; a sudden fright strikes his heart; he ducks his head, makes himself small, and dives under. There stands Verwalter Ruf, and it could be that he might someday tell his father: “Yes, and our young master was among them too.”

Soon after, Reinhold is caught in a whirl and, with many others, is swallowed by the gate of the country house. So many people are crammed into the narrow courtyard that they can hardly move.

Above, the estates deliberate; below, the students rage. They hoist a speaker onto their shoulders, and he throws words like torches into the crowd. He says: “We must stand at the height of this day!” And he says: “Whoever lacks courage on this day belongs in the nursery!”

Next to Reinhold, a student asks: “Who is that? I don’t know him.”

The speaker himself answers, accompanied by a grand gesture: “The Damocles sword of the police hovers over my head, but I say like Hütten: I have dared! I am Doctor Fischhof!”

A note flutters out of one of the windows into the courtyard. The The estates have passed a resolution; a hundred hands reach for the note; someone climbs onto the fountain roof and waves the paper over the surging heads—a broad-shouldered, bearded Futterknecht.

“Read! Read it aloud!”

Futterknecht reads: “The estates have resolved to request His Majesty to deign to order that a statement on the bank and state budget be presented…”

“Ridiculous! Are they trying to make fools of us?”

And Futterknecht continues reading: “The estates have resolved to request His Majesty to deign to order that a provincial committee of all provinces be convened to discuss timely reforms…”

“That’s typical of the estates!” — “They want to stall us to betray us!” — “Away with this nonsense!”

Futterknecht folds the paper, tears it in half, then again, letting the scraps flutter away: “I solemnly declare, in the presence of those here and in the name of the Austrian people, that we have no use for such a scrap. We want freedom, not committees and statements.”

A bang cuts through the roar. “They’re shooting at us!”

“No, no, it’s just a door slamming shut!”

“Up! Up! We want to speak to the estates ourselves!”

In a frightful crush, the crowd presses into the house, up the stairs—yes, they want to speak to the estates themselves; the days of groveling are over; they must be told plainly what it’s about.

Reinhold is pushed along, but at that moment, he stands by a window where a man is present. The man stands about a step from the window, his back to the courtyard, apparently speaking to someone in the hallway, invisible from here. And the man—head, shoulders, posture—it can only be his father. At that same moment, all sense deserts Reinhold. He doesn’t ask how his father got here, what his father is doing in the country house. He thinks: The father is everywhere, even where one least expects him, and he thinks, if the father sees me here, if the father sees me here!

Reinhold braces against the push of the crowd; he struggles desperately—no, not that, not to be driven before those clear, cold eyes. He elbows his way around, ducks, charges headfirst into the crowd, ignoring angry and mocking shouts.

It works; he reaches the gate, but only to get stuck in another equally dire crush. Across, the bayonets of soldiers glint in the midday sun, blocking access to the Hofburg. An old man in a general’s uniform towers in the saddle of his horse above the human throng. He might want to calm things, perhaps means well, but he misjudges his tone. He barks at the people as a corporal might snap at recruits on the barracks square. “Do you want to The estates have passed a resolution; a hundred hands reach for the note; someone climbs onto the fountain roof and waves the paper over the surging heads—a broad-shouldered, bearded Futterknecht.

“Read! Read it aloud!”

Futterknecht reads: “The estates have resolved to request His Majesty to deign to order that a statement on the bank and state budget be presented…”

“Ridiculous! Are they trying to make fools of us?”

And Futterknecht continues reading: “The estates have resolved to request His Majesty to deign to order that a provincial committee of all provinces be convened to discuss timely reforms…”

“That’s typical of the estates!” — “They want to stall us to betray us!” — “Away with this nonsense!”

Futterknecht folds the paper, tears it in half, then again, letting the scraps flutter away: “I solemnly declare, in the presence of those here and in the name of the Austrian people, that we have no use for such a scrap. We want freedom, not committees and statements.”

A bang cuts through the roar. “They’re shooting at us!”

“No, no, it’s just a door slamming shut!”

“Up! Up! We want to speak to the estates ourselves!”

In a frightful crush, the crowd presses into the house, up the stairs—yes, they want to speak to the estates themselves; the days of groveling are over; they must be told plainly what it’s about.

Reinhold is pushed along, but at that moment, he stands by a window where a man is present. The man stands about a step from the window, his back to the courtyard, apparently speaking to someone in the hallway, invisible from here. And the man—head, shoulders, posture—it can only be his father. At that same moment, all sense deserts Reinhold. He doesn’t ask how his father got here, what his father is doing in the country house. He thinks: The father is everywhere, even where one least expects him, and he thinks, if the father sees me here, if the father sees me here!

Reinhold braces against the push of the crowd; he struggles desperately—no, not that, not to be driven before those clear, cold eyes. He elbows his way around, ducks, charges headfirst into the crowd, ignoring angry and mocking shouts.

It works; he reaches the gate, but only to get stuck in another equally dire crush. Across, the bayonets of soldiers glint in the midday sun, blocking access to the Hofburg. An old man in a general’s uniform towers in the saddle of his horse above the human throng. He might want to calm things, perhaps means well, but he misjudges his tone. He barks at the people as a corporal might snap at recruits on the barracks square. “Do you want to “Pöbel, do you want to make common cause? Do you want to let bad people incite you?”

“Get rid of the military!”

A club swings; the blow knocks the old man’s feathered hat down, strikes his temple; beneath the white hair, dark blood wells up, dripping onto the white uniform coat.

Reinhold throws himself back into the crowd, works his way through, reaches the mouth of a side alley. He just sees a battalion of pioneers marching in from Freyung into Herrengasse, rank upon rank, filling the entire street width with leveled bayonets. It stamps the crowd into the street’s narrowness, crushing bodies to pulp; pain and rage howl. Reinhold stands as stones and wooden debris rise, and then a salvo roars.

Reinhold runs; behind him, a scattering crowd; behind the crowd, pioneers with leveled bayonets. Now and then, one of the soldiers stops and fires.

Reinhold runs; a blow hits his shoulder. He turns while running, but no one is close enough to have struck him. A few screaming women, groups of men, then the soldiers behind.

Reinhold runs, makes a sharp turn, reaches Schottentor. There’s no intent behind it; he has no definite plan; he just wants to escape the cauldron there and the father’s fixed stare. Through Schottentor, from the suburbs, more crowds of workers still approach. Fleeing people come toward them: “They’re shooting at us!” — “We’re being murdered!” — “Blood has been shed!”