WALTER BENJAMIN
175
Biichner, is a failure. His starting point is really the parable, which is
responsible to reason and therefore, as far as its wording is concerned,
cannot be entirely serious. But this parable is then subject to artistic
elaboration. It grows into a novel. And, strictly speaking, it carried the
germ of one from the start. It was never quite transparent. Moreover,
Brecht is convinced that Kafka would not have found his own form
without Dostoyevsky's Grand Inquisitor and the other parabolic
passage in the
Brothers Karamazov
where the corpse of Saint Starets
begins to stink. In Kafka, therefore, parable is in conflict with vision.
But as a visionary, Brecht says, Kafka saw what was to come without
seeing what is. He [Lavandou] stresses, as he had done earlier in Le
Lavandou, but, to me, more clearly, the prophetic side of his work.
Kafka, he says, had only one problem, that of organization. What seized
him was fear of the ant-colony state: how people become estranged
from themselves by the forms of their communal life. And certain
forms of this estrangement he foresaw , for example the procedure of the
G.P.U. He did not, however, find a solution, and did not wake from his
nightmare. Of Kafka's precision Brecht says it is that of someone
vague, a dreamer.
12th July.
Yesterday after a game of chess Brecht said:
"If
Korsch
comes we shall have to work out a new game with him. A game in
which the positions do not always remain the same; where the function
of the pieces changes if they have stood for a while on the same square:
then they become either more effective or weaker. Like this, the game
does not develop; it stays the same too long."
23rd July.
Yesterday a visit by Karin Michaelis, who is just back
from her Russian journey and full of enthusiasm. Brecht recalls his
guide Tretiakov, who showed him Moscow, proud of everything his
guest saw, no matter what. "That is no bad thing," says Brecht, "it
shows that it belongs to him. No one is proud of other people's
property." After a while he adds: "Well, in the end I did get a bit tired. I
could not admire everything, nor did I want to. It's like this: they are
his soldiers, his trucks. But, unfortunately, not mine."
24th July.
On a beam supporting the ceiling of Brecht's study are
painted the words: "Truth is concrete." On a window sill stands a little
wooden donkey that can nod its head. Brecht has hung a little notice
round its neck saying: "I too must understand it."
5th August.
Three weeks ago I gave B. my essay on Kafka. He
certainly read it, but never spoke about it of his own accord and both
times I brought the conversation round to it, replied evasively. Finally I
took back the manuscript without a word. Yesterday evening he
