Extracts from “Friends” [1]
By Hermann Hesse [2]
Translated from German by xia23
The low bar hall was full of smoke, the smell of beer, dust and noise.
Hans Calwer waved at his friend Erwin Mühletal and went to the door.
“Hey, already leaving?” one of students shouted over.
Hans only nodded and left, Mühletal followed. They stepped down from the old, steep wooden stairs and left the bar which was already quiet. Air from a cold winter night and blue starlight greeted them on the empty, wide market square. Hans took a turn toward his apartment. The friend followed silently, he accompanied Calwer home almost every evening. But by the second alley he stopped. “Yes”, he said, “then good night. I’m going to bed.”
“Good night”, Hans said unfriendly, and shortly he went away. But he turned back after few steps and called his friend.
“Erwin!”
“Yes?”
”You, I’ll still go with you.”
“All right too. But I’m going to bed, I’m already half sleeping.”
Hans turned around and took Erwin’s arm. He did not take him to his apartment, but went down to the river, over the old bridge and into a long avenue with plane trees, and Erwin went along without any objection.
“So, what’s the matter?” he finally asked. “I’m really tired."
“So what? Me too, but differently.”
“Well, how are you doing?”
“Short and good, that was my last Wednesday’s bar.”
“You are crazy.”
“Nope, you are, if you still enjoy it. Shout songs, get drunk by command, listen idiotic talks, grin yourself from 20 simpletons and let your shoulders be slapped, I won’t do that with you anymore. I’ve joined the fraternity at that time, as everyone else, deliriously. But I’m going to quit for good reasons. And that is actually tomorrow.”
“Yes, but –“
“I’ve decided, and ready for that. You are the only one who finds it out beforehand; you are also the only one whom it has something to do with. I don’t want to ask you for advice.”
“Then not. So you are leaving the fraternity. It is absolutely impossible without scandal.”
“Probably so.”
“Probably. Now, that is your business.”
“I want to be my own boss and never be the fool from three dozen of fraternity brothers. That‘s all”
“And what if you feel sorry after three weeks?”
“You now really must go to bed. Good night, I will take a walk.”
Hans went slowly from there, with a nervous, artificial, easy step, which Erwin knew well.
“Just go, just go!” he grumbled half-loudly and checked on Hans, until he disappeared in darkness.
□
He had been always good-natured and patient and whenever there had been a disagreement, he had always come and had asked for forgiveness. Now yes, he was even a good guy once. But why were all of this? What was then finally on this Hans Calwer, so people had to run after him? Yes, a little bit wit and a certain confidence in his manner, that he probably had and he could be witty. On the other hand, he was quite conceited, played the interesting things, looked down upon others. This pride, this confidence, this arrogance was unforgivable.
□
Meanwhile Hans went walking along the river, from an avenue to another avenue. He thought over what to do tomorrow. He was unpleasant to explain his leaving the fraternity.
Without Erwin he would have already done it earlier. Erwin had just held him, because he had at that time followed him in the fraternity. Erwin was no average person, but he was insecure and weak. He was reminiscent of the friendship in the first year. Since then everything had come from Hans: play, prank, fashion, sports, and lectures. Erwin had followed his strangest idea with admiration, he had actually never let him be alone. He had almost always understood him, always admired him, and agreed on everything.
If Erwin stayed in the fraternity, then Hans would have lost him. A helpless anger over dishonesty in the world and over himself would seize him again, as already happened many times, so he had always trusted him again. It was also with the university and above all with the student affairs. The university is an out-of-dated, badly organized school; it allowed students almost limitless freedom, in order to trap them later all the more painstakingly through a stereotyped exam routine again. But facing protection and bribery no one was safe. Now that bothered him little bit. But student life, nuance of the society-based origin and money, comical uniforms, being senselessly romantic with old Heidelberg [3] and fraternity, all of them not only continued to exist, but also he himself had run into the absurd trap.
□
Hans had to think of a student, who had sat as a bench neighbor many times in lectures on oriental religion science. He wore a thick loden [4] coat, farmer’s heavy boots, patched pants and a coarsely knotted scarf and was presumably a farmer’s son studying theology. He only had a good but superior smile for elegant colleagues with caps and bands. Now Hans thought, this inconspicuous student was much closer to him than his previous comrades, and he envied him somewhat for his contented calmness. So it was the one who as if he was totally alone, and the one who apparently did not know to have a shamefully desire as the others.
□
In orientalist lectures Hans regularly met that student and had often sat near him. He had seen that he took notes on his lectures by shorthand neatly and effortlessly.
Once he sat nearer to him and observed the hardworking man. He saw concentration and understanding in his face. He saw him nodding several times, once smiled and admired him for that. He decided to know the student. As the lecture ended, Hans followed the loden mantel from a distance, in order to see where he lived. But to his astonishment the stranger did not stop in any of known avenues. Hans became curious and followed him in no distance. He followed him out in a complete unknown area, so the other person heard his footsteps and turned himself back. Hans raised the cap and said good day. Both remained standing.
“Are you going for a walk?” Hans asked.
“I’m going home.”
“Yes, where do you live? Is there still any house out there?”
“Here not, but half an hour later. There is a small village, a blue brook house, and I live there.”
“May I go with you a bit? My name is Calwer.”
“Yes, nice to me you. My name is Heinrich Wirth. From the Buddha lecture there I have already known you for a long time. Earlier you used to wear a red cap.”
Hans laughed. “Yes.” He said, “But that is over now. There was a misunderstanding.” Wirth looked at him and nodded. “Do you think, nice to meet you?”
“Why then?”
“Oh, there is no particular reason. But I’ve had a feeling many times, that you did not fit in there.”
“Have you checked on me then?”
“Not really. But just like people watch each other instead. At the beginning I thought, that is also such a man above reproach. It is such a thing, isn’t it?”
“Yes, there is such a thing. Oh yes.”
“Well and then I saw, I had done you an injustice. I noticed that you really came here to listen and learn.”
“Now, the other people probably did the same thing too.”
“Do you think so? I believe, not many. Most people just want to take exams, nothing else.”
“But people also have to learn through exams.”
“Yes, but not much. What people could learn in a lecture on Buddha does not occur in the exam.”
“But universities are not really there for edification. People can read religious value in Buddha in a book.”
“That is probable. I also don’t think so.”
Cow’s hollowing could be heard from the quiet empty fields.
“The blue brook house”, Wirth said and pointed to the village. Hans wanted to say goodbye and turned back.
“Now you are almost home,” he said, “and I want now also to turn back and see that I’m coming for lunch.”
“Don’t do that”, Wirth said friendly. “Come completely with me and see where I live. You can also have lunch in the village, if you are satisfied with milk, you could be my guest.”
Hans gladly accepted the invitation. ”You live far from the city”, He said.
□
Meanwhile Erwin was not happy. His comrades knew that Hans had a reason.
One evening he came near to Hans’s apartment and saw a light from the window. He was standing there and looked up with homesickness and shame. Hans sat near the piano and was playing. Fifteen minutes later the light went off and he immediately saw Hans came out from the apartment with a young man who was tall and not well-dressed. Erwin knew that Hans didn’t just play the piano for everyone. So he had already once again found a friend..
[1]. Extracts from Friends p. 89 – p. 92, Stationen, Cengate Learning, Australia, United States, 2015
“Freunde” was published in 1908.
2]. Hermann Hesse. 7/2/1877-8/9/1962. Nobel laureate in literature in 1946. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Hesse
[3]. Heidelberg, a city in southern Germany, which was first mentioned by documentary in 1196. Heidelberg University was established in 1386.
[4]. Loden: a thick, waterproof woolen cloth.
