"Franz_Kafka_-_Diaries_1912" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kafka Franz)

Yesterday evening, at ten o'clock, I was walking at my sad pace down the Zeltnergasse. Near the Hess hat store a young man stops three steps in front of me, so
forces me to stop too, removes his hat, and then runs at me. In my first fright I step back, think at first that someone wants to know how to get to the station, but why in
this way?Чthen think, since he approaches me confidentially and looks up into my face because I am taller: Perhaps he wants money, or something worse. My
confused attention and his confused speech mingle.


УYou're a lawyer, aren't you? A doctor? Please, couldn't you give me some advice? I have a case here for which I need a lawyer.Ф


Because of caution, general suspicion, and fear that I might make a fool of myself, I deny that I am a lawyer, but am ready to advise him, what is it? He begins to talk, it
interests me; to increase my confidence I ask him to talk while we walk, he wants to go my way, no, I would rather go with him, I have no place in particular to go.


He is a good reciter, he was not nearly as good in the past as he is now, now he can already imitate Kainz so that no one can tell the difference. People may say he
only imitates him, but he puts in a lot of his own too. He is short, to be sure, but he has mimicry, memory, presence, everything, everything. During his military service
out there in Milowitz, in camp, he recited, a comrade sang, they really had a very good time. It was a beautiful time. He prefers to recite Dehmel most of all, the
passionate, frivolous poems, for instance, about the bride who pictures her bridal night to herself, when he recites that it makes a huge impression, especially on the girls.
Well, that is really obvious. He has Dehmel very beautifully bound in red leather. (He describes it with dropping gestures of his hands.) But the binding really doesn't
matter. Aside from this he likes very much to recite Rideamus. No, they don't clash with one another at all, he sees to it that there's a transition, talks between them,
whatever occurs to him, makes a fool of the public. Then УPrometheusФ is on his program too. There he isn't afraid of anyone, not even of Moissi, Moissi drinks, he
doesn't. Finally, he likes very much to read from Swet Marten; he's a new Scandinavian writer. Very good. It's sort of epigrams and short sayings. Those about
Napoleon; especially, are excellent, but so are all the others about other great men. No, he can't recite any of this yet, he hasn't learned it yet, not even read it all, but his
aunt read it to him recently and he liked it so much.


So he wanted to appear in public with this program and therefore offered himself to the Women's Progress for an evening's appearance. Really, at first he wanted to
present Eine Gutsgeschichte [A Good Story] by LagerlЎf, and had even lent this story to the chairwoman of the Women's Progress, Mrs. Durшge-Wodnanski, to look
over. She said the story was beautiful, of course, but too long to be read. He saw that, it was really too long, especially as, according to the plan of the evening, his
brother was supposed to play the piano too. This brother, twenty-one years old, a very lovely boy, is a virtuoso, he was at the music college in Berlin for two years (four
years ago, now). But came home quite spoiled. Not really spoiled, but the woman with whom he boarded fell in love with him. Later he said that he was often too tired
to play because he had to keep riding around on this boarding-bag.


So, since the Gutsgeschichte wouldn't do, they agreed on the other program: Dehmel, Rideamus, УPrometheus,Ф and Swet Marten. But now, in order to show Mrs.
Durшge in advance the sort of person he really was, he brought her the manuscript of am essay, УThe Joy of Life,Ф which he had written this summer. He wrote it in a
summer resort, wrote it in shorthand during the day, in the evening made a clean copy, polished, crossed out, but really it wasn't much work because it came off at once.
He'll lend it to me if I like, it's written in a popular style, of course, on purpose, but there are good ideas in it and it is betamt, as they say. (Pointed laughter with chin
raised.) I may leaf through it here under the electric light. (It is an appeal to youth not to be sad, for after all there is nature, freedom, Goethe, Schiller, Shakespeare,
flowers, insects, etc.) The Durшge woman said she really didn't have time to read it just then, but he could lend it to her, she would return it in a few days. He
suspected something even then and didn't want to leave it there, evaded, said, for instance, УLook, Mrs. Durшge, why should I leave it here, it's really just ordinary, it's
well written, of course, but . . .Ф None of it did any good, he had to leave it there. This was on Friday.



(28 February.) Sunday morning, while washing, it occurs to him that he hadn't seen the Tagblatt yet. He opens it by chance just at the first page of the magazine
section. The title of the first essay, УThe Child as Creator,Ф strikes him. He reads the first few linesЧand begins to cry with joy. It is his essay, word for word his
essay. So for the first time he is in print, he runs to his mother and tells her. What joy! The old woman, she has diabetes and is divorced from his father, who, by the
way, is in the right, is so proud. One son is already a virtuoso, now the other is becoming an author!