HONORARY COUNSELLOR I wrote in today — it’ll appear tomorrow, you’ll see!
BIACH (excitedly) If you’ve written in, I will too. It’s no small honour to appear in such company—
INTELLECTUAL Only one thing I find odd, now I think of it — every time, with all the thousands and tens of thousands of people conveying their congratulations, every time he publishes the address as welclass="underline" The Honourable Moriz Benedikt, Editor of the Neue Freie Presse, 11 Fichtegasse, Vienna I. I can’t help thinking that’s rather vain! He could have left out the “Honourable”, and giving the address, say, 20 times would surely have been enough.
BUSINESSMAN Don’t say that. One can’t hear it too often.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR (almost simultaneously) I don’t see that, he doesn’t want to change a thing, that’s what they wrote and that’s what should appear, he’s right!
BIACH What’s he saying? What’s he saying?
BUSINESSMAN (trying to placate them) But — oh, forget it — in Lemberg we are still holding on!
HABERDASHER Above all, it shows you that all the letters are genuine, look, Admiral Montecuccoli, no less, and nothing but Excellencies—
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Montecuccoli and Excellencies, so what? Is Berchtold a nobody? Sent in his congratulations yesterday in his own hand!
BIACH Berchtold? That’s nothing! Weiskirchner! See with your own eyes, what do you say to that! Can you believe it? Weiskirchner, the most rabid anti-Semite! Congratulating him “In all sincerity”! What does that say there? That’s nice, who wrote that, I wonder: “The Neue Freie Presse is the prayer-book of the intelligentsia.”
BUSINESSMAN But it’s true! What’s that there? Ah, interesting, the Dukes Agency takes great pleasure in the close relationship it enjoys with the Neue Freie Presse. The biggest advertising agency in Vienna, that’s saying something!
INTELLECTUAL Look at that! Even Harden — the most brilliant stylist, as we know — Harden calls him — listen to what he calls him, that’s brilliant! — “Chief of the Intellectual General Staff”!
HABERDASHER Ingenious, but not original. A few dozen of the letters have already used it; besides, it’s the obvious thing to say.
BIACH Of course, especially when the talk of Lemberg comes right next. And the speeches at the banquet were tremendous, too.
BUSINESSMAN It can’t have been at the banquet — the banquet was cancelled because of the World War, wasn’t it?
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Modesty forbids—
HABERDASHER That’s carrying respect too far!
BIACH Of course it is! Anyhow, even if it wasn’t a banquet, it was still tremendously impressive. If it hadn’t been for the war, you would have really seen something. But they refused to give up. The way they all acclaimed him was a sight to behold, the Head of Accounts and even the top delivery-woman. A press party like that is like a family get-together. I have it that the speeches were all taken down in shorthand at the time.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR But wasn’t the stenographer one of those acclaiming him too?
BIACH Yes, but all the while he was taking it down.
BUSINESSMAN Look at the list, I ask you — there’s no end to it—
INTELLECTUAL Yes, sad indeed.
BUSINESSMAN How do you mean, sad?
INTELLECTUAL Oh sorry, I was looking at the list of casualties further down — it just happens to come next, after the list of those conveying their congratulations.
BIACH So what? — what else could they do? — yes, to be sure, it’s an event our children’s children will still be talking about.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR That’s true. It’s not every day a paper is 50 years old.
BIACH Quite right, but I meant — Lemberg.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Who’s talking about Lemberg?
INTELLECTUAL (looking around apprehensively) Unfortunately there’s no denying, it wasn’t our finest hour.
BIACH What? — Not our finest hour? Say that again, out loud!
INTELLECTUAL (softly) Look, I only meant, Lemberg—
BIACH Who’s talking about Lemberg? Even if that dents our courage and our hopes, still we take heart from the front pages — the anniversary!
HONORARY COUNSELLOR You know what impresses me most? It’s not what’s on the front page that impresses me, it’s not what’s in the middle that impresses me, what impresses me is what’s at the back! Do you remember, on the day of the anniversary, the 100 pages of bank advertisements, all full-page! They had to shell out for those — in the middle of the moratorium, too — till they were bled dry! Ah, the press — its power is unshakable, but when it does the shaking, it soon strips the plum tree.
BIACH There you are, then, there’s no one in Austria with more chutzpah. He’s got imagination and temperament and intellect and convictions and is banking on God Almighty.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR You know who that reminds me of, Herr Biach, the language you just used there?
BIACH Who it reminds you of? Who should it remind you of?
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Of the Editor himself, with all those “ands.”
BIACH And what if it does? Is it any wonder? You can’t help but be spellbound. Did you read the “Questions and Answers for the Layman” in the Evening Edition the other day? Good stuff, eh? In the Evening Edition he can really be himself. He repeats everything over again. After the proclamation “In Lemberg we are still holding on”, he said it was the word “still” that strikes you, it catches your eye and demands attention and enables you to imagine it. He’s covered everything with just the word “still”! “Yesterday it was reported — today it is reported”, you can’t get that out of your head. He talks just like the rest of us talk, only more clearly. You couldn’t say whether he talks like us, or we talk like him.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Yes, and the editorial, wasn’t that the cat’s breakfast! From the very first sentence — inimitable! “The Brodsky family is one of the richest in Kiev.” And that’s it! You’re right in the middle of it all. Then he jumps from that to Talleyrand, what he said at dinner, and then you’re right in the middle of the Hungarian Compromise.
BIACH What impresses me most is when he says “Just visualize it.” Or when he evokes the power of imagination, which he does thrillingly, and you can imagine him straight away in the middle of all the gun smoke — God forbid! — and the rest of us along with him. But the most important thing for him seems to be the atmosphere, the impressions, the details, and it’s gripping when he describes how they’ve stirred up the passions. I must say what I personally like best, though, is when he imagines them tossing and turning in their beds, especially Poincaré and Grey and even the Tsar, gnawed at by worry, because things are beginning to fall apart. And maybe at this very minute, and maybe they have already, and maybe, and maybe — it’s tremendously dramatic! I’ve been told he dictates what he writes. You can imagine him dictating an editorial. I tell you, the mind boggles at the thought of the candelabra quivering in the editorial office when he dictates!
INTELLECTUAL But I happen to know, since I once went in person to complain about “The Refuse Collector and the Horsefly”—
BIACH What do you know?
INTELLECTUAL That they don’t have any candelabra there!
BIACH (getting worked up) So what do they have, then? Enough already, my dear sir — you’re a notorious killjoy, always finding fault. So they’ve got standard lamps, no matter! — the candelabra still quiver! Some of us hold on to our illusions. Waiter, bring me Bloch’s Weekly and Danzer’s Army Journal.