Heinrich Page #3

---

I want to study

but not right now!

how did you know I was here?

I've already been at home

- but when did you set out?

- this morning

without food?

Heinrich!

Heinrich!

what are you writing, Heinrich?

something on physics

for the Zenge girl?

yes

what trouble you're taking for her

wait

I'll read to you what you wrote to me

about her recently

my dear Ulrike

the only company I see daily are the Zenges

[letter to Ulrike, 12 Nov. 1799]

and I would have given up on this company too,

because of my embarrassment,

if I hadn't been resolved

to get rid of this disagreeable emotion

because during my life-path

I'll encounter all sorts of people

and I must be able to make use of everyone of them.

the eldest Zenge girl, Minette

even displays some fine feelings

which are occasionally receptive to beauty

at least, I'm content

when she's listening to me with interest

even though I get nothing from her in return

Heinrich?

yes?

but of all this there remains nothing

once the whole crowd has gathered

one couldn't call their intermingling babblings a conversation

that's her

I'll open the door

good day, Herr von Kleist

I've come to fetch today's composition

what about the composition, Wilhelmine?

won't you read it?

I will

then take it out

Wilhelmine

- yes?

- what are you reading?

- from Herr von Kleist

- what's he saying?

- he says ...

- what is it?

- that the girl ...

- yes yes, what next?

that he's been fondly in love with me for a long time

and that I'd make him happy

by giving him my hand in marriage

aren't you glad?

it feels so strange

what does he want of you this time?

Wilhelmine?

he's such a noble person

with the patience of an angel

read it to me

when a woman is adorable,

it doesn't automatically make her interesting

[letter to Wilhelmine, summer 1800]

and how can a woman obtain and sustain her husband's interest?

don't you know?

go to him and ask him

he's your fianc after all

but he already wrote it

so ... the answer

with interest

it's like with all things on earth

it's not enough

that they were created in Heaven:

He must also sustain them

if they are to last

and nothing needs the most careful nourishment more

than that mysterious thing which produces it,

we don't know how,

and which often disappears again,

we don't know how,

the interest.

and then he goes on and on

he means it more in general

yes I know

but it still hurts

and then there are other questions

he wants me to answer

question:

what is more desirable?

to have been happy for a short time

or never ever?

question:

when the husband uses his brutal right of the stronger

against the wife, with the weapons of violence

doesn't the wife too have a right against the husband?

one might call the right of the weaker

and which she could exercise

with the weapons of meekness

question:

what binds people more to each other

with the bonds of trust,

virtues or weaknesses?

I want to do everything right

what do you say to this?

when a girl is asked

what she demands of a future marriage

in order to be most happy in it,

she must decide first: 1.

what characteristics her future husband should have:

whether he should be extraordinary in mind and body,

or ordinary, and to what degree etc.

furthermore

whether he should be rich, noble etc.

what office he should hold:

whether a military office,

a civilian office, or none at all

none at all?

whether in town or in the country

and how, in each case,

its location ought to be arranged,

whether in the mountains

or on the plains,

or at the seaside, etc.

your composition has been returned

it couldn't be delivered

the Kleists have left

it doesn't matter

we'll send it on

all you did was write to each other anyway

even while he was here

Heinrich laughed ???

my heart is not ???

it is a ??? of my heart

since all this is nothing but a wish

fantasy has its unlimited field of action

and must not bind itself

to any fetters of reality

Pannwitz is dead

Pannwitz with whom you had lessons as a child

he's killed himself

because of melancholia, they say

Heinrich, sir, this is not the carriage

it is a part of my heart ???

we promised each other

we'd die together

children promise each other many things

marriage and death

Butzbach

my horses!

my horses!

so a human life would depend on a donkey's bray

[letter to Wilhelmine, 21 July 1801]

and if it had been terminated

I would have lived for this?

that would have been the Creator's intent,

regarding this dark mysterious earthly life?

hey there

it's nothing

come

I should have learned this, done this,

and nothing else?

from Frankfurt to Potsdam

from Potsdam to Dresden

from Dresden to Leipzig

from Leipzig to Halle

from Halle to Halberstadt

from Halberstadt to Wernigerode

Ilsenburg and Goslar

then ...

then to Gttingen

Kassel

in Butzbach the accident

then Rdesheim

Frankfurt on the Main

Mannheim

Heidelberg

Dorlach

Chalons-sur-Marne

and then ... Paris

a fellow student?

travelling companion

in eight days, without a stop,

we'll make Straburg-Paris, 120 miles

yes, young man

but with a wife, you can't do that

it will be impossible

it's my innate failure

never to be able to grasp the moment

[letter to Adolfine von Werdeck, 29 July 1801]

and to live always in a place

where I'm not at the moment

and in a time which has passed already

or hasn't come yet

when I was staying in my fatherland

I used to be in Paris almost all the time

and now, even though I'm staying in Paris,

I'm almost always in my fatherland

you really are bitten to death?

[Penthesilea]

not kissed to death?

so it was a mistake

kisses, bites,

that's a rhyme

and he who loves dearly

may well take the one for the other

you, my dear sweet bridegroom,

you forgive me

by Diana, I just mistook one word for another

because I wasn't master of the swift lips

but now I'll tell you clearly

how I meant it

this is, beloved, what I meant,

and nothing more, by Jupiter

if you were a man and not my sister

write a letter to Wilhelmine

yes

you really want to ... me, when I was stifling you,

like a dove, quietly

no limb you possess,

out of lust, insatiable Odiana

touched none of your limbs, doing it

will you write to Wilhelmine?

no

I'm writing about you

look, Prothoe, look

the remains of a lip, speak

doesn't it seem to you

as if he were smiling

By Olympos, he's reconciled with me

and that other part,

it's smiling too

so be it, you're right too

your idol,

if you consider everything carefully

I've devoured you out of love

kisses and bites,

that's a rhyme

heart and pains too

come, Heinrich

I attended the 14th of July,

the anniversary the storming of the Bastille

[letter to Karoline von Schlieben, 18 July 1801]

they celebrate on the same day

the feast of regained liberty and peace

I am not sure myself

how such days could be met with dignity,

but this I know:

that there can hardly be

a more undignified fashion.

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes