As if the typewriter were a reality-producing projector, he sometimes thought that the conventional present had already fallen away from him to be replaced by an entirely new existence that seemed entirely foreign, filled with images entirely other than he could expect, images that he had been fitted for by her, which she had attributed to him, described to him, made to measure, until they formed a mantle of thought, recollections of an interchangeable past that could be removed, like clothes from the body, when it got too worn, to be exchanged for a new one, newly commissioned. For her sake, he committed the years she had worked out for him to memory, more and more painfully and convincingly, so that it might perhaps become a familiar prophecy, although only for her. . for him, it remained unfamiliar. . but, anyhow.
Which was often not without consequences. Once, when he was walking through the city, he thought that the way people were behaving toward him seemed unmistakably to indicate that he didn’t exist: he wasn’t served in the pubs and cafés, and when he asked to see something in a store, the salesman didn’t just ignore his request, but also took no notice at all of his person, just as if he had never entered the store, as if the store’s door had opened without anyone coming in, yes, it seemed he had temporarily become invisible, because no one noticed him, yes, he felt as if he had been transformed into an open door-frame swaying through the alleys and streets, a frame for anyone coming toward him, a drafty doorway anyone could walk through, and was in frequent use, because people walked right through him without encountering the slightest resistance, yes, he had become the constantly, readily opened door for whatever surroundings he encountered!
By way of contrast, it seemed to him on other days that no one else existed but him: he couldn’t see anyone, or had everything become invisible, the running down of his environment at an incalculable speed was projected on the screen of air in front of him, only recognizable now by a wild trembling of the daylight that raged like a sunbeam-storm through the tides of the city, which were rocking away, while Burgmüller stood helplessly at the corner of a building, like an atlas that had ossified to an apparent standstill, supporting a column of air on his shoulders that he had to carry from dawn to dusk. .
Then, because he wanted to feel his way down into her story as deeply as possible, he finally asked her who had given this order to write, to just write everything down all the time, without speaking, without talking to each other about it, why was this order so important that, according to her, almost everyone was obeying it, or anyway still felt obliged to behave as though this was the case, the same as her, he couldn’t imagine that such a decree, which to him seemed rather abnormal, would ever be followed so unswervingly, so who had decreed it anyway, and why?
Oh, she had unfortunately forgotten that part, she replied, she had once known everything, a long time ago, or wait, now she knew it again, someone had told her recently who had made that decree ages ago, what was his name now, the name of that gentleman, yes, quite right, simply Karl, yes indeed.
Karl who? asked Burgmüller.
What do you mean who, she replied, what else should he have been called, it’s nice and short, easy to remember, Karl, Herr Karl, no one had found it necessary to tell her his so-called family name.
But he has to have one, Burgmüller insisted, he can’t be just Karl, almost everyone is called Karl today, there must have been something more to him. .?
But she, she explained, had unfortunately not yet been able to see Herr Karl herself, no one had told her anything more than Karl, presumably he himself would hardly have found the necessary time to introduce himself to her, which is why she wasn’t in a position to judge what people had told her in passing, namely that he was very, very great, which was probably in reference to his physical size, he certainly had other things to do beyond constantly becoming personally acquainted with this or that writer, but because he was so remarkably great, quite right, he wouldn’t be on record under a family name, but with a so-called epithet, the Great, yes, that was it exactly, Karl the Great, or Charlemagne as he’s sometimes called, everyone knew very well who was meant by that. .
Had her story suddenly become a historical story — or an ironically historical one? Why had she chosen Karl the Great, of all people? Because he couldn’t write and therefore had to have everything described for him by others?
Didn’t he die a long time ago? asked Burgmüller, and weren’t there a lot of other guys after him, all those Ludwigs, Ottos, Friedrichs, Wilhelms, etc.?
That’s what many people claim, she replied, but what does that mean, why shouldn’t there have been a lot of men who came after him, and yet, there has always been just him, why, do you think, would everyone otherwise still be describing everything to each other so precisely, confirming it to each other as they represent it, without really speaking with each other, or do you think everyone would have been able to continue that practice unchanged right down to the present if he weren’t personally still standing behind it. .? No, I’m certain he’s still alive. . or would you object to that?
No, but so much has happened since then, Burgmüller answered, so much that the great Herr Karl missed out on, and that is supposedly demonstrably the case, for example, with train tracks, people have stretched a giant net across all countries, on which, for example, all the regions and cities that are connected by it can exchange their buildings by throwing them at each other long-distance, as if they were reflected at each other on mirrors, yes, all those inventions, the steam engine, the sewing machine, the chaff cutter, the threshing machine, they were all invented after Herr Karl’s time, as was the typewriter too.
You said it yourself, she replied, invented, maybe not real at all, but only describable, without supporting evidence, and how is all that meant to testify against Herr Karl, how is it supposed to oppose him, what is there to be said against him?
I understand, he went on, that from the days of Herr Karl to today, right up until your time, things may not, indeed, have been correct anymore, that they might just have been, instead, the description of a vast labyrinthine gallery of mirrors that may have corresponded to, may still correspond to, the way Herr Karl saw things; but even if it’s true that Herr Karl didn’t die, no one knows that he’s still alive, so of what use is that to him, how can it be of service to him, to what end has he stuck around, did he love the time and place he lived in so much, and, at the same time, was he really so concerned about it, did he fear for it so much that he didn’t want anything to be forgotten, so that he could only permit himself to really live by decreeing that everyone else should describe everything around him more and more precisely, thus providing proof of it to him, because he was afraid he would otherwise lose the time and place he lived in, and would be forgotten with it, and thus he was forced to not let anyone else know anything about him, such that, in the end, perhaps it’s true that he really is still alive, yes, maybe you’re quite right, but what good does all that do him, what does he do with the countless reports and stories presented to him, clearly written as they are, and describing everything around him so precisely, he must be inundated by them. .?