text / [West Germany] Fu Schlondorf, Günter Grass
translation /
Kuminka Subbai
open potato field. In the distance stood rows of telephone poles and a third of the top of a brick factory chimney. An inky blue, taupe picture.
Clouds of smoke. Anna Bronsky crouched by the fire, whistling thoughtfully out of tune.
Anna's skirt was raised high in a semicircle. With a hazel stick, she took a cooked potato from the ashes of the roast potatoes and set it aside to cool. Then he tied the burnt potato with a sharp stick, put it to his mouth, and blew the dust off the skin of the potato with his cracked lips.
Anna closed her eyes while blowing. After a while, she lazily raised the eyelid of one eye, and then the eyelid of the other eye. She took a bite with her healthy, but wide-open front teeth, and let it go again, her open mouth steaming with the still-hot half of the potato. She stared blankly at the potato field. . . . Oscar's voice: " I
started long before I was born. Because when people tell their own life, they go back at least to their grandparents or grandparents.
" When it was destined to give birth to my poor mother , my unsuspecting grandmother, Anna Bronsky, in her four-layer skirt, is sitting on the edge of a potato field.
"According to the records, it was 1899, and she was sitting in Kasubei -- something was shaking and jumping in the distance." In the
distance, there were three men running between the poles.
Anna picked up another piece of potato, blew off the ash from the skin, and stuffed the whole potato into her mouth. She was munching on it, when she saw
a small man with a black beard coming from a nearby path below the ground. He jumped out, looked around in a panic, and jumped a few steps forward, terrified. Apparently someone was chasing him. He fell to the ground, sweat dripping from his forehead, panting, his moustache trembling, and crawled up to Anna, looking at Anna like a short, stocky beast.
Anna sighed deeply, tipped her toes, and lifted her potato-colored skirt up, layer by layer, until she covered the little one. The little man no longer panted and shivered in the four-layer skirt. Anna sighed and sat on top of him.
The breeze rustled in the haystacks of roast potatoes. Anna flattened her skirt, took out three potatoes from the ashes, took four raw potatoes from the basket beside her, put them into the hot ashes one by one, and covered the potatoes with more ashes. The hot ashes were poked to and fro, and the smoke was rising.
The yellow smoke drifted northeast at first, then turned back to the southwest with the wind close to the ground. Anna's skirt had just returned to its original shape, and two tall and thin guys emerged from the path like ghosts.
It can be seen from the uniforms on them that they are military police.
They almost rushed past Anna, and suddenly one of the guys remembered something, stopped in the thick smoke, and asked while coughing.
The first military policeman: "Did anyone pass by here? A guy named Kolyacek."
Anna (shaking his head): "I don't recognize such a person."
Oscar's voice: "These two wearing Prussian military police officers The man in uniform is looking for an arsonist."
The first military policeman: "He set a fire."
Anna: "The Virgin Mary!"
The first military policeman: "The sawmill burned down... Broad shoulders."
Anna: "I've never seen such a person before. He ran away like a ghost." The first military policeman
: "Where did he run away?"
The steaming potato pointed in the direction of Bissau.
The two men in uniforms hesitated, undecided whether they should go to Bissau to hunt down the culprit. They used their bayonets to stab and poke around in the still-burning haystacks. Then, suspiciously, he turned around the pile of potatoes, and stabbed the pile of potatoes a few times with his bayonet.
First military policeman: "He's not here...he must have gone to Bissau."
Second military policeman: "Not here, just there! Nowhere else!"
The military and police have always known only two possibilities.
Ana bit another half of the potato with her wide front teeth, chewing with relish, turning her eyes to the upper left. Rare raindrops fell from the sky.
The first military policeman: "Oh, it's raining again." The
military and police officers suddenly became uninterested, gave up the idea of continuing to search here, turned around and walked towards Bissau's force.
Anna cried out. The policeman swung him back and looked at her suspiciously.
Anna whispered the name of the god in a low voice.
The military police took a hundred or so steps.
Anna sighed lightly.
The military and police walked away, slowly disappearing into the night.
In the smoke from the dying fire, Anna Bronski rose. It was so hard for her to stand up, as if she had taken root here, and now she was about to interrupt the growth that had just begun and pull herself up by the roots.
When the short, broad-shouldered Koljaček was exposed to the rain without a hood, he felt chills. He quickly buttoned up his trousers, which had been untied under his skirt, under which he felt both panic and a strong desire to find a place to belong.
Anna tucked him a basket of potatoes, bent down and carried the heavier basket herself, picking up the rake and hoe in her free hand.
Anna: "Come with me, Kolyachek!"
Kolyachek: "My name is Joseph."
Anna: "Okay, come with me, Joseph." The
two left. He was five paces behind her.
Oscar's voice: "My maternal grandfather was an arsonist. He set fires many times, and all over West Prussia at that time, the sawmills provided the fuse that ignited the national sentiments of the Poles." Anna Korjache
, a wooden turf on the river bank
Ke holds a baby in his arms: daughter Agnes. A young boy named Jan Bronsky was playing nearby. The goose quacked.
There are several wooden houses on the sandy shore. Wooden rafts and tree trunks drifted slowly in the river.
Korjaček and seven other platooners were at work.
Oscar's voice: "Joseph and Anna stayed with the raft workers. It took about a year for the military police to find my grandfather again."
Four men in blue appeared on the embankment, heading towards Korya Check goes.
Korjaček ran faster and faster into the river, then jumped from raft to raft, from trunk to trunk, all the way to the heart of the river.
The man in blue shot.
Anna, who was carrying the baby, rushed towards the military police.
Anna (shouting): "Korjaček!"
Kolyacek reached the last raft and plunged it into the water, blisters popping up under the trunk. The Motrau River flows slowly.
Oscar's voice: "Korjaček has never been seen since he jumped into the water. Some say he drowned, others say..."
Chicago office buildings
can be seen through windows See the skyscrapers of the early 2000s. In front of the window stood a writing desk whose glass top reflected the reflection of the tall building.
Oscar's voice: "...he fled to America, changed his name to Joe Korsik in Chicago, and became a millionaire."
Koljacek sat stiffly at the huge writing desk, perhaps still wearing a top hat, Playing gloomily with a box of matches before he lit his cigar. A gemstone ring sparkles on the finger.
Oscar's voice: "It is said that he made his fortune from the lumber business, the match factory, and the fire insurance."
Kolyacek puffed out the blue smoke of the cigar.
The port market was
foggy.
Four women are sitting in front of the baskets, peddling their wares: cod, fluttershy...
One of them is the (young) grandmother Anna, still in her four-layered dress. She had goose, butter and eggs in front of her.
Anna: "The goslings that are neither fat nor thin...golden butter...eggs...almonds...sixty..."
A man named Schwetfegel took a hot brick out of the charcoal fire and used charcoal tongs to get under his grandmother's skirt, which she lifted to the desired height.
The camera zooms in on the bricks being fed into my grandmother's dress.
The camera pulls back: It's still the four-layer skirt and the bricks. And now sitting there is a foreign grandmother in a skirt. Next to her was Agnes, a young girl. The market supply is not as good as it used to be. This is a "radish winter" where you can't buy anything but radishes.
Oscar's voice: "My grandmother wore her four-layer dress all year long, sitting and hawking things that were brought to the market. And so she grew old. The first world war broke out, the goslings disappeared, All I can buy are turnips. My poor mother has grown up too, and she is worried about her cousin. Jan has to go to war, but he is willing to stay by her side." A Captain of the
Military District Command
Medic: "Name?"
In front of the medical examination team stood Jan Bronski, naked.
Young: "Bronsky Young."
Captain Medic: "Birth year?"
Young: "1897."
Captain Medic (staring at him): "Probation!" Agnes is here
before Military District Command
wait. Young stepped out of the gate and threw himself into Agnes' arms. She was wearing protective clothing.
Young (to her in a low voice): "No ass, no neck, come back in a year!"
Agnes hugs him.
Oscar's voice: "This is the first time my poor mother hugged her cousin, and I don't know if she will be happier when she hugs him later. This young wartime lover has been fervently in love Until one day, a gentleman named Matzerath appeared. Alfred Matzerath was born and raised in Rhineland. At the Silberham American Field Hospital, he had a unique Rhineland personality. , won the hearts of all nurses, including Assistant Nurse Agnes.”
Field Hospital Kitchen
Matzerath was stirring the soup in the cauldron and limping to the table with a stick to get the seasoning. Agnes and two other nurses waited as he tasted the soup before handing her another spoonful.
Other nurses approached and admired the man in the starched chef's hat.
Matzerath: "Too much chili and less lilac?"
Agnes sucked the soup and nodded absently at Matzerath, the tip of her tongue sliding gently over her upper lip.
An old cook watched them and said something in Kasu Baitu. Agnes laughed.
Matzerath: "What did she say?"
Agnes: "She said, you are a gifted cook, Mr. Matzerath, you will turn your feelings into soup."
Port Market (1920)
Grandmother Anna Bronski, in her four-tiered dress, was sitting in the same place. Daughter Agnes stood by. The two women looked at Alfred Matzerath and Jan Bronski, who were hanging out like boys in the distance.
Oscar's voice: "The war is finally over. Danzig is declared a free zone. The Poles have their own post office in the city, and stamp collector Jan Bronski found work there. Alfrew Red Matzerath stayed in Danzig."
The two young men looked at the gantry crane.
Jan: "We Kasu whites have always lived on this land. We arrived here before the Poles, and of course before you Germans."
Alfred Matzerath: "Don't read your scriptures. Now! Jan! Now at peace! Germans, Pirans, Kasu whites, all will now live together in peace." The
grandmother and Agnes watched the two men in trance.
Oscar's voice: "These two gentlemen who are completely different but have the same feelings for my mother have a good impression of each other. In such a trinity relationship, they brought me, Oscar, into the world.
" Ganesh walked towards the two men, wrapping her arms around one's neck and the other's hand.
La Bess Road
grocery store.
The paws slapped the deserted streets. Lightning flashes instantly illuminate the front of the house. The atmosphere is eerie, mysterious, and sarcastic.
Oscar's voice: "The Sun is in the constellation Virgo. Neptune moves into the tenth house signifying middle age, fixing Oscar between wonder and disappointment. Jupiter, opposite Saturn, raises questions about the child's lineage."
Matzerath's house, bedroom,
Agnes groaned in labor pain, and it was a shower of lingering heat outside.
Agnes Matzerath's uterus
, Oscar, floats in the amniotic fluid, staring at the camera with wide eyes. Oscar's voice: "When I was a fetus, gravityless, floating carefree in my pristine environment, I listened to the drums of my mother's heart until I was rudely
kicked out of there."
Zerat's house. Bedroom
midwife: "Come out, come out, Mrs. Matzerath, work hard!" It was
darkness. Finally, the newborn's first glance.
In the bright light, the mother's thighs and knees appeared, with the bedroom lamp in the middle.
A fluffy nocturnal moth flew around the two sixty-watt bulbs, casting a huge dangling shadow on the ceiling, hitting the bulbs.
Oscar's voice: "I was born. The first image I saw in the world was those two 60-watt light bulbs.
"
The midwife's hand grabbed Zhansheng'er's feet and slowly lifted him up.
A small watering can enters the picture.
Midwife: "A boy! A sturdy lad!"
Oscar's face was wrinkled, head down.
It was still raining outside, and grandmother Kolyacek went to the door and announced loudly, "Alfred! It's a boy!"
Matzerath appeared at the door, looking at Agnes.
Matzerath: "A boy? Really?"
Agnes nodded weakly.
Matzerath crept up to her. At this moment Jan Bronski, who was behind him, looked in from the door. Matzerath turned to Bronsky and beckoned him in.
Matzerath: "It's a boy! Come on, weigh him and see how much he weighs."
He took the scale from the shop.
The midwife and grandmother bathe the baby in the basin by the bed.
Matzerath bent towards Agnes and took her hand.
Agnes: "I knew it was going to be a boy, although I sometimes said that it would be a girl."
She found Bronsky at the door and smiled at him.
Oscar's voice: "Even though I was crying on the surface and looked like a cyan baby, my ears could hear everything. I listened critically to my parents' first impromptu remarks about me. ."
Matzerath pointed to the baby.
Matzerath: "When he grows up, he will take over this shop. We are working so hard now, and finally there is hope."
Agnes: "When little Oscar is three years old, we will buy him one. Tin drum." The
baby saw himself walking down the stairs with the tin drum on his back.
Oscar's voice: "It was the tin drum that was promised to me that prevented me from further expressing my desire to become a fetus again. Besides, the midwife has also cut my umbilical cord, and there is nothing I can do. Since I have already Having been driven out of the womb by them irretrievably, I could hardly wait patiently for my third birthday."
A bedroom in a four-story rental building, yellow, facing the yard. Above Qing's head hangs a portrait of Magdalena repenting in a glass frame. She was flesh-colored and lay in a cave. Opposite the double bed is a white wardrobe with a full-length mirror, a dressing table on the left, and a five-drawer chest of drawers with a marble top on the right. The lamps in the bedroom hung from the ceiling, not stretched with cloth as in the living room, but supported on two brass arms. Through the pink porcelain shade, you can see the light bulb emitting light.
The living room is the central part of the ground floor. Looking out from the two windows, one can see the front garden and the street covered with Baltic sea shells in summer. The wallpaper paste in the living room is grape red, and the bench covers are almost purple. A folding dining table with round corners; four leather chairs and a small round table for smoking set stand on the blue carpet. Between the windows is a black and yellow grandfather clock. The black piano is next to the purple bench. Above the piano hangs a portrait of Beethoven. In front of the piano is a swivel chair resting on a buff rug. Opposite the piano sits a wine cabinet with a black corrugated top and black claw feet.
In addition to the long, slightly curved aisle, mostly filled with soap flake boxes, there's a spacious kitchen that's at least half-filled with items such as cans, flour bags, and sacks of oatmeal.
As the birthday party in Matzerath's house-living room draws to a
close, leftover snacks, coffee, and half-serving bowls of cream are on the table. People are drinking gin.
Grandma was dozing off on the sofa when a distant drum beat woke her up.
Grandma: "What's the matter?"
She recognized Oscar, who was walking into the house with a tin drum.
Grandmother: "Ah, it's you, little Oscar."
Grave, the vegetable merchant, is telling the story of a boy scout who saved lives. The ruddy Gretzen Scheffler and her baker husband listened in fascination. Lena Graves got bored and grabbed the bottle.
Gretzen and Matzerath, who was sitting next to her, laughed out loud several times. Oscar beat the drum and walked around the table, observing the group. Then, he turned to the piano. His mother was singing an aria from an operetta, accommodating herself expertly. Uncle Jan Bronski was standing next to her, holding a Rowing cigarette in one hand in a golden cigarette holder, and the other, when he was not turning over the sheet music, rested lightly on her. on the shoulders.
They sang:
Hey, tell me, who presided over our wedding?
It's the bullfinch, it's the bullfinch,
it's the blue sky above
us that binds us together.
Ah, behold, the sky is full of stars shining with gold,
How majestic the sky is.
The nightingale sang softly:
Love, love is the power of God.
Ah, the nightingale sings softly:
Love, love is the power of God.
Oscar's voice: "The people at the birthday party—the parents and the neighbors—were half-drunk and formed a strange pair: Mom and Uncle Jan at the piano; Gretzen Scheffler listening to the vegetables The story of Shang Grave; the baker Scheffler was drinking with Lena Grave."
The following conversations overlap and cross.
Greve: "It was May 14th and we were walking through Forgan, walking through the forest... We wanted to escape the city and go into nature... Yes, yes, do a good thing every day. Give someone an apple ...First of all we should relearn, take care of our bodies, and start young. Lena often doesn't understand me. We shouldn't just mess around. She's living day by day; and I think, I feel, Every day is a special day."
Agnes and Jan sang at the piano. After he turned a page of sheet music, his hand disappeared into her neckline.
All of this has not escaped Oscar's eyes.
Schaeffler: "No one thinks of us in the middle class."
Matzerath: "They desperately serve those state employees, those debtors."
Schaeffler: "In the earliest days, the small bread was only two pfennig , all of a sudden it rose to a hundred marks, seven hundred marks and fifty pfennigs, and in a few days it rose to a thousand. Well, now the authentic buns are three pfennigs again."
Matzerath: "I've always said that, what people need is a stable currency."
Lena Greve: "Alfred, look what's in the glass. Let's toast the new mark! To your three fennies Cheers."
Greve: "Cheers to the young generation!"
Gretchen Scheffler: "Cheers to all that is good."
Greve: "May I call you "you," Gretchen?"
Scheffler: "Then I'll call you Lena." Lena hugged him.
Matzerath: "Ah, children, we will never be together like young people like today!"
Agnes and Bronsky are singing (due).
Agnes looked up at Young. His hand went all the way into her neckline, wiggling there.
Grocery
Matzerath came out of the cellar with beer. In his haste, he did not close the cover.
Matzerath's living room,
Greif, had Oscar standing by the door frame and carved a groove into the wood with a thick-handled knife.
Grave: "September 12, 1927. Next year you'll be this tall..." He gestures "...and then so high, so high, until I'm as tall."
Matzerath (coming over) : "Stock-brand beer, cool and refreshing, just got it from the cellar."
Oscar sneaked up to his grandmother, trying to get under her dress. She pushed him aside.
The poker player sat down and opened a beer bottle.
Agnes: "Are you playing, Mr. Scheffler?"
Scheffler looked at his pocket watch: "No, no. Let's play. I like to watch... Besides, I'll have to go to bed later.
" Scheffler: "He's always listless."
Greve: "Then you shouldn't marry a baker, Gretzen."
He laughed erratically.
Nobody thinks about Oscar anymore. He crawled under the table and hid in the shadow of the tablecloth.
Matzerath: "Eighteen..."
Jan Bronski: "Good."
Matzerath: "Twenty..."
Jan Bronski: "Good."
They called until thirty .
Matzerath: "Pas."
Jan Bronski: "I also do."
Agnes: "We're playing a game of hearts."
Everyone is playing cards.
Jan Bronski lost; he was distracted because he wasn't thinking about playing poker at all, but something else.
Under the table, Oscar saw that Jan had taken off his left shoe and stretched his grey troweled foot over Oscar's head, looking for the knee of Agnes, who was sitting across from him. No sooner had they met than Agnes leaned towards the table so that Yang could lift the skirt of her dress, sliding first with her toes, then with her entire socked foot between her thighs.
At this time, Agnes was playing a spade, and the others followed with cards of the same color.
Agnes played the card: "Yeah, the cards are laid out like this...so we can see clearly."
Agnes dealt the card, and Bronski played the diamond.
Agnes: "God, Jan, you have to pay attention. Don't you know the cubes are all out?"
Matzerath: "Don't be noisy, kids, let's play!"
Agnes: "He Zhang card actually won." The
card is over. They are counting the points.
Agnes: "How much are you? Eighteen. One game, three shots, four tailors, plus hearts, forty in total."
Jan Bronski: "What are those two hole cards? Alas, you see, it's all squares, but how could I know." The aisle door
opened and Oscar came out.
Can see and hear people playing cards inside. Oscar glanced at the dent in the doorpost and closed the door.
Oscar's voice: "On this day, I thought about the world of adults and my future, and decided not to grow up anymore. I don't want to grow even one centimeter. I want to be a three-year-old forever, a Dwarf."
Oscar resolutely walked through the dark aisle to the shop.
The grocery store
is under the oblique light of the streetlights, and the house is like a terrifying maze, full of boxes, cans, shelves, ladders, bottles...
The cover door to the cellar was open. A light is lit below, adding a mysterious sense of depth to the entrance.
Oscar looked down, took off the tin drum slowly, and inserted the drumsticks into the special loops on the trousers straps.
Oscar's voice: "It took me at least about a minute to figure it out. The covered door leading to the basement storage room hinted at what I should do." The
cellar
Oscar walked down the battered ladder of sixteen steps and placed it in the middle of the flour sacks After picking up his tin drum, he went up the ladder again, going up the eighth level, down the third level, then up the fifth level, down one level...
His eyes fell on the shelf for the raspberry juice.
Then, he took a deep breath, jumped up and grabbed a bottle of fruit juice...
Oscar whirled, tumbled, and rolled down the wooden ladder.
The clinking of shards of glass and the banging of wooden ladders were enough to startle the whole house.
At this time, the blood dripping from the wound on Oscar's head mixed with raspberry juice. Before he was completely unconscious, he affirmed the success of the attempt and glanced at the still-intact tin drum.
Shouting: "Oscar, where are you?"
"Where are you, Oscar?"
"What's the matter?"
At the open door with the flap came Matzerath, mother, and the rest of the party, who suddenly All Qing Dai came.
Agnes: "He's there! My God, he fell off the ladder!" The
boy scout leader Grave rushed to Oscar, carefully picked up the fainted Oscar, and climbed up the ladder.
Gretzen Scheffler: "I'm going to call Dr. Ryratz right away."
Mom yelled at Matzerath: "He's bleeding! How did the cover open? Alfred, it's you, you murderer! You cover the door..."
Matzerath: "...I'm going to get the beer."
Agnes: "...the door is you..."
Matzerath: "...be quiet, I'm just going to get you a beer."
Agnes: "Murderer!"
She slapped her husband. When he persuaded her to be quiet, she slapped him again with the back of her hand.
Yang: "I ask you, Agnes, I ask you...be reasonable."
Matzerath: "You don't need to worry about it, cousin!"
Yang looked down at the floor in embarrassment.
On a flour sack in the kiln lay the tin drum with red and white teeth, safe and sound.
Matzerath's house · Bedroom
Oscar lying on a small bed. Dr. Ryratz, with his black beard, leaned over to look at him.
Finally, the doctor straightened up, turned his back to Oscar, and said to Oscar's parents with a serious expression,
"Let's rest in bed for a week or two, and little Oscar can get up again."
Oscar carefully opened one eye.
Oscar's voice: "My shock to the kiln was a complete success. Everyone will say this since: Our little Oscar, fell off the crypt ladder on his third birthday, even though nothing was hurt. But he just doesn't want to grow taller, he doesn't want to grow even a centimeter."
Labes Road
Oscar beat the drum and walked on the street, alarming all the neighbors.
Matzerath's house, the living room
, Oscar beat the drums one or two, one or two, and entered the house. His mother sat at the table with the bills, the cash book and Jan Bronski's stamp album in front of her.
Jan Bronski was holding a pair of tweezers and was picking up a stamp, and Oscar reached out to grab it.
Jan: "Don't move, Oscar. This stamp is too precious. It's the first Polish stamp in over a hundred years!"
He carefully inserted the stamp into the stamp album.
Matzerath came out of the kitchen: "The meal is ready!"
Oscar just looked at him and continued to beat the drums.
Yang: "Okay! Then I'm leaving, it's time."
Agnes: "Aren't you eating here? Alfred burned mushrooms today."
Young: "No, no... I'm on duty at the window this afternoon, and it's twenty minutes before work time."
He Closed his stamp album.
Matzerath, in an apron, brought dishes and cutlery. Agnes moved the ledger away.
Matzerath: "I said, don't beat it at home! Besides, the drum is broken, and you'll be injured."
Indeed, the drum base was worn; close, very dangerous. Matzerath put down the plate. Oscar wants to sneak away.
Matzerath: "Put the drum here, Oscar, you're going to get hurt, and it's mine."
He reached for the drum and cut his fingers.
Matzerath: "Look, what I said!"
Oscar pressed the drum tighter with both hands.
Agnes walked to the wine cabinet and wanted to try something else.
Agnes: "You give me the drum, Oscar, and I'll give you a piece of chocolate."
She pouted and handed the chocolate to Oscar.
Jan: "Well, what a delicious chocolate! Give the drum to mom, Oscar!"
Oscar: "No! Oscar is not happy!"
Matzerath: "Okay! Then I'll do it!"
He tugged at the tin drum. Oscar is also not showing weakness. Two people compete for drums. After a while, Oscar is exhausted, the drum slips from his hand, and he swoops to get it back, when Oscar makes his first destructive shout. In an instant, the polished glass that blocked the flies and dust in front of the honey yellow dial of the grandfather was shattered and fell to the floor, shattering into countless pieces.
Everyone was stunned. Stunned, Matzerath let go of the drum.
Matzerath: "The clock is broken."
Oscar also looked at the product of his own voice in surprise.
The adults all turned pale and looked at each other at a loss.
Yang squirmed his dry lips and said in a barely audible voice: "Oh, Lamb of God, take away the sins of this world..."
Agnes brought an iron dustpan: "Shards will bring luck."
Oscar's voice : "Just like that, I found that my voice could sing continuously and vibrate at a high pitch, so that no one would dare to take my tin drum from me.
"Because, when people want to take me When the drum is smashed, I call, and when I call, the precious object shatters. " Oscar is walking in front of a group of children in
La Bess Road
, like a rat-catcher from Hameln. He is beating the drum, the other children are singing.
Grave is leaving the barber shop.
Children:
teapot, tea The urn, the little tea urn, the
beer without sugar...
Mrs. Holler plays the piano and
goes to open the window first.
Oscar sings and shatters the glass of a street lamp. The
trumpeter Mein blows The Internationale out of the attic, always regularly One note wrong.
A small marching band of stormtroopers rounds the corner. Oscar and his entourage cross the road ahead of them beating drums.
Herbert and the others throw tomatoes and stones at the Nazis.
Gray Her husband's vegetable store,
Graves, wore a gardener's green apron over the Boy Scouts uniform, next to a pile of lettuce and cabbage, a potato in his hand, and was advertising to the patrons.
Graves: "Please Look at this extraordinary potato; it is plump, stubborn, constantly devising new shapes, and yet such a chaste pulp! I love this potato because it speaks to me. The
customers listened to the speech in embarrassment. Oscar stood on the small steps and watched.
Female customer: "Yes, this year's potatoes are a little bigger than last year." "
Grave:" How much do you want. "
Female customer: "Ten pounds. "
He poured the potatoes into the tin plate on the scale. When the pointer points to "5", the self-ringing clock installed in the scale plays a ditty.
Grave: "I just loaded it last night. When it weighs five kilograms, it plays Remain faithful and honest until it goes into the merciless grave...,"
Grave picked up a chalk on the slate as the female customer left. Write down the price of the day. On the wall behind him is a striking advertisement for the German Gymnastics Games, featuring a group of lanky lads doing gymnastics, along with a replica of Michelangelo's "David" and a fish tank.
Oscar found a piece of chalk, and he also wanted to write.
Grave: "What are you doing there?"
Oscar: "Oscar wants to learn to write."
Oscar's drawing is crooked.
Oscar: "1! 2?"
Grave took the chalk from him.
Greve: "Put it down, Oscar, you'll never learn. Writing...reading...the great classical writer...all the eternal truth...death and life..." The
plump Lena and Greve leaned against each other. window, looking at them. Mein was playing "The Internationale" in his attic, and the trumpet echoed off the roof. Oscar's first day of school in
La Bess Road .
Holding sugar sacks and cakes, he stood solemnly among the grinning children. Matzerath took pictures of them.
Classroom
The classroom was filled with six-year-olds. Mothers lined up against the wall opposite the window as first-graders scrambled for seats. Now, the sugar bags are in the arms of the mothers.
Miss Sporlenhauer, the teacher, came in. She wore an angular dress that gave the impression of dry masculinity, and the folds of her neck were creased by her starched collar, which deepened the feeling. an impression.
Miss Sporlenhauer: "My name is Sporlenhauer, and I'm your teacher. You can call me Miss from now on. Now, dear children, would you like to sing a song?
" Shouting wildly.
At this moment, Oscar stood up abruptly, hurriedly took out the drumsticks from the strap, and beat the drum loudly.
Miss Sporlenhauer went over and said to Oscar: "You must be little Oscar, we've heard of you. You strike so well! Isn't it, boys? Isn't our Oscar a good one? Drummer?" The
children answered loudly: "Yes, yes, yes!"
Miss Sporlenhauer: "But for now, we're going to keep the drums in the classroom cabinet."
Oscar put his arms around his drum.
Miss Sporlenhauer: "The drum will be tired. It wants to sleep. I'll give it back to you after school."
Her short-nailed hands reached for the instrument, threatening Oscar's icy gaze. down, the hand retracted again.
Miss Sporlenhauer: "Oscar, you're a disobedient child!"
She walked to the podium, opened her handbag, found a stack of notes, kept one, and distributed the rest to the mothers.
Miss Sporlenhauer: "I'll read the timetable to you now. Okay, let's start...Monday, write...Let's read, write..."
Everyone said in unison: "Write."
Sporlenhauer Miss El: "Arithmetic..." The
children shouted in unison to the accompaniment of the tin drum: "Arithmetic!"
Miss Sporlenhauer: "Oscar, don't knock now. Religion..."
Oscar's atheism thumped The sound of a drum drowned out the answer.
Miss Sporlenhauer couldn't help it. She hurried over, reaching for the tin drum, when Oscar made his glass-shattering cry.
Several pieces of glass above the classroom windows shattered.
The children fell silent. The fresh spring air blows unobstructed straight into the room from the windows.
Suddenly, Sporlenhauer picked up a pointer and slapped the top of Oscar's desk, the ink in the bottle splashing purple. Then she angrily beat the tin drum with the elastic pointer.
Now it was Oscar's turn, and he was furious.
His cry shattered two of Sporlenhauer's spectacle lenses, and Miss Sporlenhauer, with blood dripping from her eyebrows and wearing an empty spectacle frame, groped back to the podium, screaming uncontrollably. stand up.
Dr. Horace's clinic
Dr. Horace looked at the medical record card: "...special...very special...how old do you think he is?"
Agnes: "six years old, doctor."
He thought deeply Shaking his head, he continued to ask Oscar's mother.
Dr. Horace: "How long has it been since he fell off the cellar ladder?"
Agnes: "It will be four years until September 12, doctor."
Dr. Horace: "I want to be more careful . Check the spine.... Nurse Inge, please undress little Oscar." The
nurse walked over to undress Oscar, but met firm resistance from Oscar, because to undress Oscar, the drum had to be removed first.
Nurse Inge said softly: "...Be obedient, my child, and return the drum to you right away."
Agnes: "Give me the drum, and I'll hold it for you."
Oscar grabbed his Tin drum, very tenacious.
Nurse Inge: "If you do this, you won't be able to take off your shirt."
Oscar didn't move. Nurse Inge turned to the doctor and shrugged helplessly.
Agnes: "Little Oscar, if you are not good, uncle will not treat you."
Oscar stared at the fetus in an alcohol bottle.
The doctor wanted to do it himself, prompting a barrage of destructive yelling.
Oscar also gave a more restrained first cry, and immediately cut the glass case to a certain length and width. Inside the cabinet were Dr. Horace's carefully preserved bottles of alcohol marked with snakes, salamanders, turtles, pig embryos, human embryos, and monkey embryos. Then, an almost square piece of glass on the front of the glass case tilted forward and fell to the ground, breaking into thousands of pieces.
Then Oscar made a more varied and aggressive cry, almost to the point of hoarseness.
Glass bottles burst open one by one.
The partially concentrated greenish alcohol, along with the pale specimens in the bottle looking at it all with some annoyance, spilled onto the red linoleum of the floor.
Dr. Horatz calmly sat down in his swivel chair, holding the neatly ironed trouser line in his hand, and lifted his feet to let the solution flow under his feet.
Dr. Horatz said excitedly: "Extraordinary...extraordinary...I will write an article in our professional magazine aptly appraising this voice. …Well, if you agree , Mrs. Matzerath."
Agnes nodded in agreement. She covered her nose with a handkerchief, and Nurse Inge opened the window.
Months after the grocery store
, Matzerath opened the iron shutters and Agnes read the article in the medical journal to her grandmother and several female customers.
Agnes: "The high register of this devastating sound can generate so much power that it is possible to speculate that it is caused by a special structure in the back of the throat of the boy Oscar Matzerath. Of course it is not Excluding the possibility of a special vocal cord structure, at least that's the assumption. . . . "
Agnet read the unfamiliar medical terms without stopping, but slowed down when she read her son's name.
Oscar sat in a corner and listened.
Grandmother: "Did the doctor also write why he doesn't want to grow?"
Agnes: "You have to ask this one!"
Matzerath was filling her grandmother with kerosene.
Matzerath: "What did you say?"
Agnes: "Ask you why he doesn't want to grow up."
Matzerath: "Shut up! He is your son and my son, if No more..."
Agnes: "Who didn't close the deck door? Is it you or me?"
Oscar slipped off the flour sack and slipped out of the way when the almost-routine quarrel broke out again.
Is the yard
black cook here?
Here, here, here...
a bunch of playful kids shouting and singing, and a few others, eight to ten years old, among them Suzy Carter (accompanied by her shepherd dog as usual) , and Nussie Ike, Axel Misch, Harry Schrager, and little Cass cooking soup over a small fire.
I turned three big circles, the
fourth time I lost the stick, the
fifth time, Mrs. Schmidt, please come with me!
Axel and Harry used blankets and rags to set up what looked like a tent in the cooking area. At this moment, old Hyland came out of his small shack with the rabbit he had just slaughtered.
Here she is, here she is,
cook from America.
Oscar, as usual, stood by and observed their stylized cooking techniques.
Is the black cook here?
Here, here, here! Suzy Carter: "Uncle Hyland
! Let's play with the rabbit in the soup. I want to see if it can swim."
Then nail the rabbit's hind legs to the wooden fence and remove the skins all the way to the ears.
Oscar got closer and saw that they had mixed a handful of dust into the soup. Little Hans Colin took out two live frogs from his pocket.
Hans: "I caught it in the pond!"
When the frog sank into the soup without a sound and without any resistance, at the mouth of Suzy Carter, the only girl in the tent, Showing disappointment.
Nussey Ake was the first to unbutton his pants, and the other children followed his example and urinated in the pot. Then, everyone looked at Susie, and Axel handed her a rice cooker with a broken side.
Oscar was about to leave, but stopped again, watching Suzy—presumably she wasn't wearing panties under her dress—squatted down, hugged her knees, and stuffed the pot underneath. The pan made a rattling sound. Susie, who also contributed to this pot of soup, stared straight ahead.
Oscar spread his legs and ran.
The sound of running led everyone to him. 丨
Suzy Carter stood up from the pot: "He's going to tell us! What to do?!"
They chased after him and squeezed him into a corner of the backyard. Suzy's sheepdog barked.
Axel grabs Oscar from behind. Susie showed her wet and neat teeth, stuck out her tongue and smiled, standing in front of the tin drum.
Suzy Carter: "It's okay, let him try it too!"
Harry and Cass brought the steaming pan over.
Suzy looked at Oscar as she took the spoon from Nussy and polished it on her thigh. Like a capable housewife ready to taste the gruel, she stirred the pot first, and then blew the spoon full of soup to cool.
Axel clung to Oscar, who was punching and kicking.
Axel: "Cough, come on!"
Suzy Carter: "Is Black Chef here? Here, here, here!"
She pinched Oscar's nose and forced the spoon into Oscar's mouth. Oscar choked and swallowed. Then he vomited again amid the cries of the children who had gone away. Advertising column in
Hevelyn Square in the city center , newsboy. A tram tinkled past. Mother took Oscar's hand and crossed the street. The horn of a car. They walked towards a red brick building. Red and white flags fly from the roof. On the gate is a statue of an eagle wearing a crown. A postman delivering an urgent letter rides a bicycle.
Oscar's voice: "I feel like our streets and our yard are getting smaller and smaller. I long to go far, and I never pass up every opportunity to be in town alone or with my mom. At the same time, I can escape the ambush of the cooks who cook the soup." Jan Bronski of the
Polish Post Office · Sales Office
posted various stamps to Lodz, Lublin and Krakow. Stamp the envelope.
He glanced at the big clock in the business hall and began to pack his office supplies carefully. He took off the cuff and put it in one place.
He looked at the clock again, it was one minute to five. He waited patiently, saw the pointer jump to exactly five, stood up, greeted his boss, Dr. Mikon, in Polish, and walked to the door.
The gate of the Polish Post Office was
in the concierge, and Agnes was waiting with Oscar. Kerbera, the housekeeper, looked at the tin drum, which was completely worn out.
Kerbera: "The drum is broken, Oscar. Can I fix it for you?"
Agnes: "No, no. I'll buy him a new one."
He returned the drum to Oscar, opened the door, Let the last customers go.
Jan Bronski also came out and said hello to Oscar and Agnes.
Young: "Look, Oscar, buy a new drum here. I have something important to do. I have to go. Goodbye, Agnes."
He raised his hat.
Agnes: "Goodbye, cousin."
This way of saying goodbye is somehow odd.
Agnes and Oscar walk into the toy store.
Toy Store
Sigismund Marcus, the small, lively owner, looked up when the copper bell on the store door reported a customer. He walked towards the Oscar mother and son, overjoyed at the sight of Agnes.
Marcus said, "Look, who's here? I saw the distinguished Mrs. Matzerath, and little Oscar. I wish you all the best!" He kissed Agnes' hand, and continued, "Maybe Do you want a new drum?"
Agnes: "Yes, Mr. Marcus, it's time for another change. My Oscar is a diligent drummer."
Marcus: "Buy him a new one, one with a tooth pattern. Let him Pick one from my drums."
Agnes: "Mr. Marcus, can little Oscar stay with you for half an hour? I have some important things to do."
Marcus said a little. Taunting, but inoffensive: "He can stay here. I'll protect him like I protect my own eyes. Mrs. Matzerath can go about her important business undisturbed."
He smiled oddly sighed and bowed, which aroused Oscar's suspicion.
Oscar sat down obediently in a chair and didn't even look back when Agnes left the store behind him. He sat there without saying a word, the new drum on his knees, staring straight ahead.
Oscar sat motionless for a while. Then he stood up abruptly, picked up the tin drum, and ran out the door of the store.
Street
Oscar squeezed into the crowd and walked through the waist of the adult. He looked for his mother's rust-brown clothes.
The rust-brown clothes disappeared in a small alley.
Oscar followed.
Carpenter's Alley
He watched carefully around the corner and saw his mother stop and look back in front of a rental apartment.
He immediately retracted his head.
Floria Apartment
Mom walks into the Floria rental apartment. Jan Bronski appeared at an open window on the third floor, and he drew the curtains.
Agnes entered the room and undressed as quickly as Young. Yang still did not forget to fold the seam of his trousers.
They embraced passionately, fell on the bed making love, throbbing violently.
Oscar (from below) looks up.
Oscar stepped back and bumped into a cyclist who fell on the flagstone with his full fish basket.
clock tower
The Tin Drummer stood before the brick wall of the bell tower, which slanted upwards. He looked up: pigeons flew out of alcoves, resting on drip spouts and recessed windows jutting out of the eaves.
Oscar sat down on a stone edge. Legs in stockings passed in front of him. He looked up again at the spire of the bell tower.
The clock tower
dove flew up, startling him. Oscar climbed the dark spiral staircase to the corridor that encircled the clock tower. He looked into the dizzying depths. His waist is lower, does he want to jump? No, he sat down, shoved his legs into the railing, and looked away from the pillar that he was holding in his right hand, to the city below, with his left hand protecting his tin drum.
Oscar's voice: "No one wants to take Oscar's drums, but he still has to shout!"
Oscar began to scream sharply: "Ah--!"
The two glass windows in the middle left of the lounge of the Municipal Theater lost the setting sun The afterglow tinkled down the street.
Oscar shouted again: "Ah—!"
The glass in the lounge burst. Fragments fell from the window frame like an artificial waterfall.
Seen from above: passers-by jumping aside, horses trembling, vehicles biting each other, an excited crowd gathers.
A gentleman was determined to get out of the store, but in front of him the glass house fell like an avalanche. He shrank back immediately.
Many shouted:
"Sunspots!"
"Cosmic rays..."
"Polish nationalists!"
"They're shooting from the clock tower!"
Someone pointed high. All necks stretched, but no movement was noticed on the top of the clock tower.
The toy store
Sigismund Marcus stood in front of Agnes, and all the little cloth animals—bears, monkeys, dogs—even blinking dolls, firetrucks, wooden horses, and puppets. look at him.
Marcus's two hands clasped his mother's, revealing brown spots with light hair on the backs of his hands.
Marcus: "You don't want to be with Bronski anymore. It's not a good thing for him to be talking at the Polish post office. I mean, because he's with the Poles. You don't want to be on the Poles' side, You have to follow the Germans, because they are going to gain power soon, not today, or tomorrow."
Oscar showed up, listen.
Marcus knelt down: "Maybe, if you want, just go with your Marcus, go with Marcus, he has been baptized recently."
Agnes: "Don't do this, Marcus S, please don't be in the store..."
She pulled him up.
Marcus was even more urgent: "Let's go to London, Mrs. Agnes, I have business there and have enough money... Maybe you don't want to talk to Marcus, because you despise him, then you despise him He would. But he begged you from the bottom of his heart, don't be with Bronski, he's at the Polish post office. They, the Germans, the Poles are finished."
Just as Agnes was struck by the many possibilities When the impossible things made him want to cry and laugh, Marcus found Oscar standing at the door of the store. He let go of his mother's hand and pointed at Oscar with five expressive fingers.
Marcus: "Here, look, he's here! We're taking him to London too. He'll live like a prince, like a prince!"
Mom also turned to Oscar with a smile on her face. Turning to Marcus again, shaking his head.
Agnes: "I thank you, Marcus, but no. Really, not because of Bronsky."
Marcus bowed deeply. Marcus: "Please forgive Marcus, he should have thought that it wasn't because of Bronsky
. You'd better stay with your Matzerath." From the open window came the radio from La Bess Road Hitler's speech broadcast here. Agnes didn't say a word, and led the child home unhappily. She looked at Oscar from the side thoughtfully. He pretended not to notice her gaze. At the grocery store, she let go of him and went inside. grocery store
Matzerath is receiving the last customer, Grandma Truczynski. Agnes trotted past him, went behind the counter, took off her apron from the hook, and tied it to her body.
Matzerath asked affectionately: "Well, it's a good walk, right!" And to the old man affectionately, "Is there anything else, grandma? Well, today's business is over."
He sent the old man out and looked at Agne Si glanced at her, she was standing behind the cash register, and took off her apron.
Matzerath: "What's the matter, Agnes?"
Agnes: "I'm listening to the Führer everywhere, but not in our house."
She ran into the back room.
Horses in circus
feathers gallop across the arena. Whip sound. The horse's hoof tapped the plank. The sand rises. Oscar hides behind his mother in fear.
Mom watched intently.
With the last blow of the whip, the circus manager let go of the horses.
Oscar sticks his head hesitantly from behind his mother, clapping along with the others, clapping his hands at a slower and slower pace, while his eyes are getting bigger and bigger. He saw something incredible.
dwarf! An adult, but no taller than him, came out. This is the dwarf, Bebra the musical clown, playing "Good Mother, Give Me a Pony..." with bottles of different sizes
, and Oscar stands up to see it better.
There were more dwarfs, and a whole group of dwarfs, clowns and acrobats, appeared behind Bebra. They juggled, somersaulted, and stood beside him.
Oscar held his breath in surprise.
His parents looked at each other. For the first time, they realized that one day their Oscars would look like this.
Circus tent and animal pen
intermission.
Oscar slipped out. He got under the car and bumped into some little goats.
Clown Bebra, wearing overalls and slippers, walked past him with a bucket in his hand.
The eyes of the two met suddenly. Bebra stopped immediately, put down the bucket, and tilted his big head.
Bebra said jealously: "Look! Today's three-year-old child will no longer grow." Oscar said nothing. "My name is Bebra..." The dwarf who was ten centimeters taller than Oscar introduced himself, "I am a direct descendant of Prince Ogan, so I am also a descendant of Ludwig XIV, because Ludwig is his My father, not Savarjard as some people say."
Oscar: "I'm
Oscar—" This time Oscar spoke and stretched his hand towards Beb.
Bebra: "Tell me, good Oscar, you are probably fourteen or five years old..."
Oscar: "Nine years - nine and a half."
Bebra: "Impossible. Guess how old I am ?"
Oscar: "Thirty-five."
Bebra: "You're a compliment, young friend. Thirty-five is a thing of the past! I'm celebrating my fifty-third birthday in August. Now. I can be your grandfather!—Are you an artist too?"
Oscar: "No, though I..."
He let out his shrill glass-shattering cry, the lighting of the three-pan circus field The lamp became the victim.
Bebra's eyes widened in surprise.
Oscar: "...As you can see, you have the artistic talent to perform on stage."
Bebra: "It's wonderful, it's wonderful! You must come here when you get us."
Oscar: "You know, Bebra Mr. Bra..." He sat in a cab, his legs slumped, "you know, I'd rather be a spectator and let my little art come to fruition in secret."
Bebra raised his shrunken index finger: "Good Oscar, please believe the words of an experienced colleague: a person like us must not belong to the audience. People like us must show up and control the situation, Or the others will do it!" He approached Oscar and whispered meaningfully, "The others are coming, and they'll take over the square for the festival. They'll have a torch parade! They'll build a reviewing stand. , Occupy the reviewing stand and pray for our doom from the stand!"
Someone shouted Oscar's name.
Bebra: "Looking for you, my friend. We'll see you again. We're too young to be found."
Oscar's mother yelled.
She came out of the back of an overnight caravan just in time to see Bebra kissing her lost son's forehead. She drew a cross.
Bebra picked up the bucket, swayed his shoulders, and hurried away with broken steps, turning back and shouting, "You're coming!"
Oscar showed for the first time that he could speak. Since then, he has always spoken only to children and dwarfs. When meeting adults, he still slurred a few words like a three-year-old child.
Staircase
The children were fighting around a Nazi flag.
Jan Bronski appeared. The children shouted at him: "Hey, Hitler!"
Matzerath's living room
Sunday morning.
Matzerath solemnly took off the hood of the VW radio. He took down the Beethoven statue and hung up Adolf Hitler in its place.
Agnes fiddled with the knob of the radio, then picked up the Beethoven portrait she had taken off, trying to find a place to hang it.
Through the open door, Matzerath can be seen changing in the bedroom.
The march on the radio was interrupted by a live broadcast of a review somewhere.
Oscar stood in front of Hitler's portrait, looking at the Führer face-to-face, thinking about hitting the right drum on the drum.
Jan Bronski, dressed in a dainty coat and with a Polish newspaper under his arm, entered with awe.
Jan: "Good morning, good Sunday everyone! Good morning, Alfred!"
Matzerath came out of the bedroom with loose leggings hanging from his legs.
Matzerath: "The damn leggings keep slipping." To Agnes, "I have to buy boots!"
Agnes: "Boots are too expensive, you know. "
Matzerath T: "Then at least buy a pair of leather leggings. It's definitely not possible like this. Good morning, cousin."
He stopped in front of Bronsky.
Yang: "Are you going to the review?"
He nodded in the direction of the radio.
Matzerath said solemnly: "There is a big meeting on the lawn in May! The district captain Lubuzak is going to speak. He can speak, listen to me, he may speak! Besides, the days we are going through now, we must carry It 's in the annals of history! So you can't stand idly by!"
He put his feet on the chair. Agnes tied his leggings. Jan opens a newspaper.
Matzerath: "You'd better read the newspaper "Danzig Sentinel". You chose Polish nationality back then. Anyway, it was nonsense. I always advise you. Think again, cousin, don't regret it Too late..."
Yang looked at him thoughtfully and put down the newspaper.
The gaiters were tied, and Matzerath bent his knees to see if it fit.
Agnes: "Bring an umbrella, it looks like it's going to rain."
She handed him the black umbrella.
Matzerath: "I can't hold an umbrella in my uniform!"
He tightened the leather strap of his hat. The military cap is the only military marking on his body. He was wearing a white shirt, a black tie, and a "swastika" armband.
Matzerath: "The soup is on the stove. Just stir it frequently and cook for another 20 minutes."
Agnes: "You won't eat anything before you go?"
Matzerath: "No It's time. It's official business, so you can't do it for personal reasons!"
He walked to the door, raised his hand, perhaps feeling inappropriate, and walked away without looking back without calling "Hi, Hittler."
Bronski breathed a sigh of relief, walked to the couch, carefully pinched the straight trouser line, and sat down.
Oscar sat down beside him and pointed his eyes.
Oscar: "Blue, blue eyes. Oscar has blue eyes too."
Jan: "We both inherited the blue eyes of the
Bronskis." Agnes said in Kasu vernacular: "Don't say that in front of the children. Kind of."
She took off her shoes, stood between the two sitting on the sofa, and nailed ruthenium to the wall. Oscar holds a portrait of Beethoven. Jan held Agnes' hips to keep her from shaking. She spit against a loose thread in the stocking.
The picture is hung. Oscar slid to the floor, observing the gloomy-eyed man in the portrait.
Mom and Bronsky sat on the couch, whispering in Kasu vernacular.
Oscar climbed into the chair in front of the radio, when the radio interviewer excitedly announced:
"Now, the Minister of Training, our Dr. Lubzak speaks !
"
tower. Six swastika flags stand side by side, below are rectangular flags, pennants and four-cornered flags, then below are SS soldiers in black uniforms with leather straps around their chins, and then two rows of hands in leather hoops stormtroopers on top. Beneath them were women leaders with kindly faces. In the middle is a podium with a "Swastika" flag. On the left and right are the stormtroopers, the Hitler Youth, and perhaps the marching band of the cavalry stormtroopers.
Lubuzak, an intellectual who graduated from the Goebbels school and a stout district captain, was speaking.
Lubuzak: "Dear fellow men and women from Danzig, Langfreur, Ohla, Hitlitz and Pranst. Whether you are from the Highlands or the Plains, I know that all of you have bad hearts. A strong desire. This desire has lived in our hearts ever since a humiliating order separated us from our dear German homeland, that we shall return to the German Empire!"
Thunderous applause.
Oscar squeezed between the plank fences, stepped on the muddy grass, and approached the review stand from behind. All he could see was the red planks, the riding boots, and the buttocks of the crowd. He slipped between the pillars and under the reviewing stand, bumping into a protruding ceiling, where a nail pierced through the wood nicked his knee.
Oscar crawled past the many pairs of rattling riding boots, and past the slender women's boots.
Lübzak: "What is this free zone that they so generously gave us? Like lice in fur, Poles entered our port and settled in Westerplatt. They also In the heart of our dear old city, we were given a Polish post office. (Whistle) We are grateful for this gift! (Laughter, often) When Poles didn't know what communication was, we Germans Got our own post office. We taught them how to write letters! One day we will help the Poles distribute mail. In my name, in Danzig where I was born, in my baptized Mott Rau vouch! (chattering shouts) Our hearts, our borders will be opened. We will be welcomed back to the Reich, just like our beloved Führer... (Applause)... Adolf Hitler was recently at Bickerberg As promised us in the Harvest speech."
In the base of the reviewing stand, under the podium, Oscar found a spot behind the plywood and flags. From there, he could see everything going on outside through a knot hole in the plank, unnoticed.
Someone approached the speaker and whispered something to him.
Lubuzak: "Now, my dear fellow men and women, let us extend a warm welcome to the guests from the Empire and the district captain sent by the Führer. Our comrade Albert Förster has just entered the venue. ." The
horn sounded loudly.
Oscar saw through the knot hole that the guests from the Empire were walking straight through a passage formed by his comrades towards the reviewing stand, followed by a few stormtroopers.
The Nazi march was played.
Oscar straightened the drum. But he was hitting a different kind of beat: four or three. Hearing this beat, the Youth League, which was a board away from him, felt a little inexplicable. He looked around with pleading eyes.
Oscar's four or three beats were even more urgent.
The Youth League members also beat four or three beats on his war drum.
This one inspired Oscar. He beats the waltz beat more artistically and cheerfully.
Other members of the student gang and the flat drum of the Hitler Youth League joined in.
Oscar grinned.
Several people in the crowd were already waltzing. At this time a recorder also played four or three beats.
"Blue Danube, blue Danube..."
Some people laughed, others hummed. Then the trumpeters finally woke up: they also played "Blue Danube".
The flute also joined in: "The blue Danube..."
Lübuzak looked around at a loss, and summoned an SS officer to him.
Lubuzak whispered emotionally to the SS officers.
Oscar saw through the knot hole that the rhythm drove people's footsteps, and the review team quickly disintegrated. Now people turn left and right there. Guests from the Empire were quickly surrounded. The phalanx dispersed. The symmetrical order is over.
Lubuzak on the reviewing stand no longer whispered. He cursed and roared. The few remaining loyalists were shouting wildly, issuing and executing orders. Squads of the SA and SS ran there, boots stomping on the floor and thumping. They searched fruitlessly for what they imagined to be a socialist or communist sabotage group hiding behind the scenes.
Some sang the lyrics out loud, others laughed.
Oscar gets carried away.
A party member, swaying from side to side to the beat, turned to his female neighbor and asked her to dance. Others danced with them.
People gleefully danced the Vienna waltz on the May Lawn.
rainstorm. A sudden torrential rain dispersed the crowd. Only Lu Buzak stood in the rain with his arms outstretched, motionless.
In Brosson or
Good Friday in Thorped 1938. The endless Baltic Sea lazily laps the sand. In the background is a cold drink shop with a nailed door, a sanatorium with its windows tightly sealed, and a trestle with no flags.
Agnes took Oscar's hand, wearing a light blue spring coat with a purplish-purple collar, and looked into the distance. Both of them were barefoot, and with great interest they stomped footsteps on the sand washed by the heavy rain. They took the shoes in their hands.
Agnes sat on a rock. Matzerath and Jan Bronski approached. Jan knelt down before Agnes and helped her put on her shoes.
His hand slid up his leg to the skirt.
Matzerath pretended not to see it, and turned the camera elsewhere to snap a shot.
The sun is not very strong, and the sky is clear without a trace of wind. On the horizon can be seen the Hella Peninsula and a few wisps of smoke rising from the ship.
On the bumpy berm, four people jumped from one stone to another and ran out to sea.
The end of the berm. Sit and turn a person under the sign that marks the beginning of the sea. He was wearing a dock porter's hat and swab. There was a sack of potatoes beside him, and something was wriggling in the sack. The man was pulling one end of a clothesline.
The ropes disappeared with the weeds into the filthy Motlaw River, which slapped against the stones on the berm as it entered the sea.
Agnes came over, and she asked, "Hey, uncle, can you fish with a clothesline?" The
porter said, "I think so."
He grinned, revealing a smoky yellow residual tooth. He didn't want to say any more, and spit big mouthfuls of phlegm into the cracks of the granite. Then he began to take the rope up one by one.
Agnes: "Is there really a fish? Or is it just a broken shoe?"
Dock Porter: "Oh, we'll have to see what's going on first."
He struggled to straighten up and tugged on the rope, getting harder and harder, and suddenly he hit the stone in the opposite direction of the rope and rolled down, groaning.
Dock Porter: "Oh, we've got to see what's going on..."
He stretched out his arms, reaching for the little inlet where the water was rolling among the granites.
The Matzeraths and Cousin Yang looked at him.
Now, the porter caught something, and he pulled up a very heavy object that was dripping with water. He threw a spray of water among his audience: it was the head of a horse, the head of a black horse, that is, the head of a horse with a black mane. The horse may have neighed yesterday or the day before. The man in the porter's hat was already standing beside the horse's head with his legs spread apart, and many light green eels crawled out of the horse's head with wickedness. He held on to the eel with great effort, because these lepidocytic fish are fast and nimble on smooth stones.
The seagulls also flew over immediately, chirping and pounced, trying to snatch away a few small fish in groups of three or five, but they couldn't disperse them.
Matzerath: "These things are really fat!" The
porter continued to catch fish: "This is fat? Did you know that after the famous Battle of Skagerrak, when we and the British... ...You understand... After the
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