human
But that's all piffle, Herr von Niebeldingk, ... all this book-worm business can go to the devil.... Life--life--life--that's the main thing!
gpt
What do you call life, Fritz?
human
Well, how am I to tell you? D'you know how I feel? As if I were standing in front of a great, closed garden ... and I know that all Paradise is inside ... and occasionally a strain of music floats out ... and occasionally a white garment glitters ... and I'd like to get in and I can't. That's life, you see. And I've got to stand miserably outside?
gpt
Well, you don't impress me as such a miserable creature?
human
No, no, in a way, not. On the coarser side, so to speak, I have a good deal of fun. Out there around _Philippstrasse_ and _Marienstrasse_ there are women enough--stylish and fine-looking and everything you want. And my friends are great fellows, too. Every one can stand his fifteen glasses ... I suppose I am an ass, and perhaps it's only moral _katzenjammer_ on account of this past week. But when I walk the streets and see the tall, distinguished houses and think of all those people and their lives, yonder a millionaire, here a minister of state, and think that, once upon a time, they were all crude boys like myself--well, then I have the feeling as if I'd never attain anything, but always remain what I am.
gpt
Well, my dear Fritz, the only remedy for that lies in that 'book-worm business' as you call it. Sit down on your breeches and work!
human
No, Herr von Niebeldingk, it isn't that either ... let me tell you. Day before yesterday I was at the opera.... They sang the _Götterddmmerung_.... You know, of course. There is _Siegfried_, a fellow like myself, ... not more than twenty ... I sat upstairs in the third row with two seamstresses. I'd picked them up in the _Chausseestrasse_--cute little beasts, too.... But when _Brunhilde_ stretched out her wonderful, white arms to him and sang: 'On to new deeds, O hero!' why I felt like taking the two girls by the scruff of the neck and pitching them down into the pit, I was so ashamed. Because, you see, _Siegfried_ had his _Brunhilde_ who inspired him to do great deeds. And what have I? ... A couple of hard cases picked up in the street.
gpt
Afterwards, I suppose, you felt more reconciled?
human
That shows how little you know me. I'd promised the girls supper. So I had to eat with them. But when that was over I let 'em slide. I ran about in the streets and just--howled!
gpt
Very well, but what exactly are you after?
human
That's what I don't know, Herr von Niebeldingk. Oh, if I knew! But it's something quite indefinite--hard to think, hard to comprehend. I'd like to howl with laughter and I don't know why ... to shriek, and I don't know what about.
gpt
Blessed youth!