Ingo Schulze - New Lives

The high point of my appearance before the draft board was a certain interview. “Several highly placed individuals,” the officer behind the desk said, “have great plans for you. Great plans!” He recommended a three-year tour of duty, which would be of advantage to my further development.

In his eyes my exhilaration was simply arrogance, and when I turned him down, he threatened, rather clumsily, to deny me my diploma or matriculation. He was more successful at gloomy descriptions of the everyday life of soldiers who were a disappointment to a government of workers and peasants. Much to my satisfaction I noticed the spit thickening at the corners of his mouth, his rapidly fluttering eyelids, the reddish blue tinge of his complexion, most intense around the nostrils, and watched as the ballpoint pen in his right hand practiced Morse code against the desktop. Trying hard to provide a literary fullness to my ideas, I saw myself standing at attention in my underwear, shivering in the chilly room, but undaunted.

Believe me — after my first draft board appearance, I looked forward to the army.

An intermezzo at the end of my junior year might also be worth mentioning. It was about four months after the Karl and Rosa episode, when without warning, right in the middle of class, the door handle clanked and the vice principal called out my last and first names. I stood up, she waved me toward her. I knew right away: this was not about my mother’s being in an accident or some other private catastrophe.

I followed her. From behind closed doors came the grumble of classes in session. Up the stairs, past a mural of the eleventh of Marx’s Feuerbach theses, according to which philosophers had just had different interpretations of the world, but the main thing was to change it. I concentrated on the play of our vice principal’s calf muscles. I exchanged a mute greeting with the secretary in the principal’s reception room. I would later describe the odor as a blend of cigarettes, floor wax, and plywood — but I probably didn’t notice a thing. I tried to gain control over my agitation by focusing on the secretary’s sandals.

Geronimo had had to deal only with the principal. Two more men were waiting for me. They sat side by side at a table turned lengthwise to abut the principal’s desk. They took their time putting out their cigarettes. When they looked up, I greeted them as well.

I wasn’t disappointed by their appearance. The older one at least, with his rheumy eyes and black hair combed straight back, matched my expectations. The other one seemed more friendly, the jock buddy on your team. The director sat there like an umpire, his palms pressed together. He looked exhausted and perplexed. Rheumy Eyes began in a disciplinary tone of voice, saying that they were here for a very serious matter. I already had hopes that they would let me remain standing, like a prisoner, when Rheumy Eyes briefly extended his forefinger, which was his way of saying, Sit down.

In my mind I was running through my poems. Which one had made them prick up their ears, which one did they think was the most dangerous? Jock Buddy was resting his hands on the file, it was imposing. How had they got hold of them? What I wanted to say was: “Yes, you’re speaking with the author, but I’ve already thrown that poem out”—because of faulty rhythms and rhymes. Only recently I had run across Mayakovsky’s A Drop of Tar, a slim volume put out by Insel, in which he describes the construction of his poems — highly recommended reading. Mayakovsky, who would take his own life, writes a poem upbraiding Yessenin for committing suicide. Yes, I planned to use Mayakovsky to lead our Checka agents around by the nose.

The bell rang for a change of class, then rang again for class to begin, and I still didn’t understand the point of their questions about my family, especially about relatives in the West. Yes, we were planning to fly to Budapest. If they wanted to chat — please, I had time. This was getting me out of chemistry and Russian both. Jock Buddy and I were now engaged in a smiling contest. When he asked for his next cup of coffee, he also ordered a glass of seltzer for me and offered me a cigarette — then immediately pretended he had forgotten I was just a student.

I was expecting a nasty turn of events at any moment. I was curious how they would segue into my poems. My first district poetry seminar had begun with the question, who among those attending were of the opinion that literature must be oppositional.

It had all happened so fast that time. 149Now I finally had the chance to correct my mistake. True literature is by its very nature oppositional.

When the bell rang for the last class of the day, Jock Buddy asked why my mother was planning, together with me, with the Enrico Türmer sitting here now in this room, to leave the German Democratic Republic by illegal means. “We merely want to know why. We have more than enough proof that this is the case.”

Rage and shame throttled me, I fought back the tears. So that’s what they thought was a direct hit. Rheumy Eyes and Jock Buddy fired their barrage of questions, bang, bang, bang, bang. I got to hear things I had said during class breaks, disparaging remarks about the antifascist protection barrier; Vera was quoted and described as an element hostile to the state; Geronimo was granted the honor of being mentioned several times. Over and over, Geronimo! It was like some curse. Which is why it took me longer than I would have liked to regain command of a firm voice. I don’t think that I did in fact stand up, but when I recall that day I can only see myself standing to deliver my speech. We both spoke at the same time. Not in my wildest dreams had I ever thought of leaving this country. For me nothing could be worse than having to abandon it. This was my spot, these were my roots — my family, my school, my home was here. What would I do in the West?

I babbled away like a windup toy, and at some point they fell silent. “I want,” I said, “to become a writer, and as a writer I have no choice but to work where I know my way around, where people live who share my experiences. A person such as myself would never leave a country in which literature is of the utmost importance.” Did they get my threat at all? “What would I do in the West?” I repeated, fully aware that I had succeeded in sounding convincing — except for a missing a word or two: What would I do in the West now ? was the real question, or at this point. But the more I kept on talking, the more I realized that I was slowly running out — if not of rage — then at least of arguments.

I defended Vera, an exceptional talent, who found herself thwarted in her development and self-realization, Vera, who merely offered her candid opinion, which they ought to be happy to hear.

I added several remarks about the social role of literature, before I asked finally asked them what justification they had for this false charge of wanting to flee the republic. And then I heard myself calling their suspicions shameless — shameless, yes, shameless! I couldn’t have put it any better. They had to know that there was no rebuke more beloved by the people’s pedagogues than: “I’m ashamed for you! I’m ashamed for you all!” 150

“We’re asking the questions here,” Jock Buddy interrupted, smiling yet again. I assumed that his smile came from the fact that he was quoting a well-known phrase, a joke for insiders.

Rheumy Eyes wanted to know why my mother claimed that our trip to Budapest was one awarded her for professional excellence, and whether perhaps she was, without my knowledge, planning to flee the republic. Both of them noticed how I hesitated before I replied. Then we all fell silent, until Jock Buddy gave the principal a nod.