H. Adler - The Wall

Only thus was I able to grasp that I had outlasted it all, that every past venture would be repeated, as well as the talk of it. This was a much more dependent existence than the earlier one that had disappeared, but I could exist and want something, perhaps even act. It was difficult and required a long journey, but it was possible. It also lay much further off than where I had already gotten to, for, in fact, so far it was not entirely there but rather summoned one, presenting itself as that which had not yet been experienced, rolling forward on the wheels of hope, also requiring the denial of memory. In drawing me toward it, it succeeded in my relinquishing myself, such that memory was allowed only as an aid along the way and not valid in itself; nor was the way itself valid, for the way was through memory. But, because the goal itself does not exist, everything is the way toward it, though there is no real way, because it itself is already composed of past and future memory, the thin and yet so thick link between origin and destination, both no more than dreams imprisoned within consciousness, and not, in truth, known. At the start, everything is allowed, and, once you arrive at the destination, nothing else is needed, and in between is the murky choice. This choice is not free, though it appears to be free when it detaches itself from time and place. Small and retreating, harried and exposed, there I found myself, a tiny cell around me, the circumscribed choice, fourfold, a wall between origin and destination, a little person in between with the face of Adam, his confused, reawakened gaze staring at the wall, the walls, four walls that I had completely decorated and covered with memory and assorted items, as well as by day and by night, the wondrous blossoming outside the window.

My office was the only place where I could be certain that, for a few hours, I would be left alone. If Herr Schnabelberger, Frau Dr. Kulka, and my other colleagues had left the building, and only Herr Geschlieder guarded our treasures downstairs in what had once served as the janitor’s apartment, it was hard for someone to surprise me here up above, and so on long evenings and over entire weekends I was happy to be there on my own. Indeed, I sat there amid the dangers of memory, an imprudent move, but it was peaceful, though without warning it could suddenly become threatening, nor did it ever provide a moment of certainty. Instead, it scurried forth from the painted faces and approached, perverting a possible order to the world and deriding any unseemly wish for it. But it tolerated me and my works, which were both commanded and voluntary, the careful touch of my tentative hands that sometimes caused misfortune. Paintings fell from frames, frames fell to pieces, flakes of paint fell off, thick mildew and heaps of dust wanted to consume the painfully extinguished with their gentle force, yet the faces had not given up and still looked out with the quiet patience of the ruined, still able to hope for help because we were there. The fresh varnish applied by the attendant employed by Frau Dr. Kulka in our hospital was administered tenderly, like a balm on a cool back, functioning as healing care. They brought to me the neediest patients, who were therefore the most deserving of loving kindness, which was a burdensome task for my conscience, which I had sought to sort through scrupulously so that those who had suffered could not accuse me of favoritism. Alas, all of the sick had a right to be saved, all pain deserved to be relieved; yet how poor was our hospital, how painful the choice was for me! How could I be just?

Then a consulting group met. Herr Schnabelberger was a good-natured hospital director, his responsibility as administrator being to worry about the costs. Frau Dr. Kulka, on the other hand, acted with beastly aggression, shoving away anyone who might be badly ill because she found them detestable and worthless, pulling out, instead, the somewhat fresh and hardly worn face of a boy, for whom a sudden love within her burned, because he had such a lovely smile, which was why the boy should be saved first, for he was young, and he could be granted a promising future. Frau Dr. Kulka, however, did not only favor the boy, for she was not so unjust; an unassuming little mother, older and with a very tattered silk scarf, could also captivate her. Quickly the beloved creature was pulled out, turned around for consideration and inspection, and showered with many a warm gaze. It was an honor and a courtesy if Frau Dr. Kulka nodded in sympathy to such a helpless creature. Finally we agreed, Schnabelberger and myself most often agreeing, the choice made; the sick one presented to us would be taken care of, while the rest had to be patient, for none would be allowed to perish. I had already written down a lot about the past of each of the invalids as they were presented for the catalog, for all our records on the sick had to be precise and detailed. This was good for the patients, for this allowed them, as far as our capabilities would permit, to last well into the future. Someday someone would thank us — that was what Frau Dr. Kulka thought — all of these treasures made available to the public once again, the entire past revealed. Frau Dr. Kulka fought hard with the authorities for approval of a bigger and more dignified space for a gallery as a permanent resting ground in honor of our patients. Yet I couldn’t call them patients or the sick, for the doctor found that disagreeable. Angrily she said that she found such expressions perverse on my part, and yet I was right. Herr Schnabelberger sought to appease her.

“Dr. Landau has a deep relation with our paintings. Each painting is for him a living person. Therefore he treats them almost like a house doctor. We should be pleased. Let him have his fun when he talks about our patients!”

“That’s a morbid view. I also find it tasteless. He talks as if they are guests here, patients and sick people, and that’s not right. It makes us look ridiculous.”

Herr Schnabelberger defended me again.

“He is high-strung. He cannot deem the pictures dead, and he stops short of saying they are alive. Instead, he thinks of them as something in between, therefore he calls them patients.”

Frau Dr. Kulka was not convinced. She approved of my work, my diligence, even my ideas, but my behavior she had to condemn.

“No museum would allow this. We cannot tolerate any such exception.”

I had to promise her that I would not refer to the paintings as patients or as students; for us there was only an inventory with many objects. This and nothing else was the proper approach of a museum that wished to concern itself with history. I could see what she meant and didn’t want to cause any difficulties, but what one meant by history was to me unclear.

“How can you say that, Frau Doctor? History, and yet we are standing right in the middle of it.”

“I don’t see what your problem is.”

“Not my problem but, rather, the problem of history.”

“Do you need a definition?”

“Not really. I’m not interested in abstractions, for I don’t trust pure philosophy. What really riles me is the difference between ‘what was’ and ‘what is.’ Where the past ends and where the present starts. In between is something that is unsolvable and unexplainable.”

“Am I too dumb to understand?”

“But Frau Doctor,” said Herr Schnabelberger, “we’re all that dumb! I don’t understand, either.”

“Then we’re in agreement. I say, yes, one can’t explain it. There must be a bridge to the present, and that disturbs me and gives me no rest. Just think, yesterday something happened which the whole world talks about because of how many people it still touches today and will touch for a long time. When is it something that happens and when is it history?”