“Have you sent off the letter already?” Simon asked.
“Yes,” Hedwig went on, “what could have stopped me? Perhaps I shall soon be going away from here, and this departure worries me; for I am leaving behind a great deal and shall perhaps not receive anything in exchange that would allow me to forget what I’ve discarded and abandoned. Nevertheless I have firmly made up my mind to leave; I don’t wish to be alone with my dreams any longer. You too will be leaving soon, and then what would I be doing here? You’ll leave me behind like some leftover scrap, like an object that’s gone bad, or rather it’ll be like this: The entire place, this village, everything here will be the scrap, the abandoned, discarded, disregarded object — and I’ll still be sitting right in the middle? No, I’ve become far too accustomed to seeing the life we lead here with the help of your eyes, finding it beautiful as long as you did; and you did find it beautiful, and so I found it beautiful as well. But I wouldn’t go on finding it beautiful and large enough for me, I’d despise it for being limited and dull, and it would in fact become limited and dull because of my indifference and contempt. I cannot live and at the same time despise my life. I must find myself a life, a new life, even if all of life consists only of an endless search for life. What is respect compared to this other thing: being happy and having satisfied the heart’s pride. Even being unhappy is better than being respected. I am unhappy, despite the respect I enjoy; and so in my own eyes I don’t deserve this respect; for I consider only happiness worthy of respect. Therefore I must try whether it is possible to be happy without insisting on respect. Perhaps there is a happiness of this sort for me, and a respect accorded to love and longing rather than cleverness. I don’t want to be unhappy just because I lacked the courage to admit to myself that a person can be unhappy on account of trying to be happy. Unhappiness of this sort is worthy of respect; the other isn’t; it isn’t possible to respect a lack of courage. How can I sit by any longer as I condemn myself to a life that brings only respect, and brings respect only from people who always want you to be just the way it suits them best? Why should it suit them at all? And why must a person go through the experience of learning that what you derive from all of this is worth nothing at all? So now you’ve worried and waited and provided, and in the end you’ve been made a fool of. It’s bitterly foolish to insist on waiting for things; nothing ever comes to us if we don’t go and get it ourselves. To be sure, we’re given a scare by cowards who make such a show of being worried on our account. I almost hate them now, the ones who start shaking their heads the minute you say anything even the least bit bold. I’d like to see how they behave when they hear that the act requiring courage has been successfully carried out. How these advice-givers will scatter before the mighty heart of a freely performed deed! And how they enslave you with their saccharine love if you fail to find this courage and instead submit to them. People here will be so sorry to see me move away and will be unable to understand how I can be leaving behind such a pleasant and beneficial place; and I too shall be leaving the country with a sentiment that still wishes to persuade me to remain. I dreamt of becoming a farmwife, of belonging to a man, a simple and tender human being, of owning a home with a bit of land and bit of garden, with a bit of sky to go along with them, of planting and tilling and demanding no other love than respect and experiencing the delight of watching my children grow up, which I’d have found perfectly adequate compensation for the loss of a deeper love. The sky would have touched the earth, each day would have rolled the one before it down into time and times, and with all my cares I’d soon have become an old woman standing on sunny Sundays at the door of my house, already almost uncomprehendingly watching the people walk past. Then I’d never again have striven for happiness and would have forgotten all more ardent sentiments, I’d have obeyed my husband and his commands, along with what I’d have envisioned as my duty. And I’d have known what duties were expected of a farmer’s wife. My dreams would have gone to sleep with the days like evenings, they would never again have made demands. I’d have been contented and gay — content because I didn’t know any better and gay because it wouldn’t have been right to show my husband an ill-tempered, worry-darkened brow. My husband would perhaps have been tactful enough to go easy on me at first, when many things would still be surging and thrashing ardently within me, and to educate me gently for the tasks that lay ahead, which I would have gratefully accepted; and then things would have been all right, and one day I’d have observed with astonishment that I no longer enjoyed the company of women whose dispositions were characterized by impetuousness and longing, that is, those whose nature was as mine once had been, for I considered them dangerous and harmful. In a word: I would have become just like all the others and would have understood life just as all the rest understood it. But all these things remained a mere dream. I would be wary of saying something like this to anyone but you. Dreamers aren’t ridiculous in your eyes, nor do you despise anyone for dreaming, since you despise no one at all. And it’s not as if I were usually so high-strung. How could I be? It’s just that I’ve gone on a bit too long just now, and when I speak in such a way, it’s easy for me to say too much. A person can’t help wishing to elucidate all her feelings, and yet this isn’t possible, all you do is talk yourself into a frenzy. Come, let’s go to bed—”