The Dedalus Book of German Decadence (7 page)

‘I can make you into
his
slave,’ she replied quickly. ‘Do I not have absolute power over you? Do I not have your agreement? But, naturally, it would only please you if I tied you up and said to him: ‘Do what you want with him.’

‘Are you mad!’ I screamed.

‘I am quite rational,’ she said, calmly. ‘I give you one last warning. Don’t put up any resistance, not now, when I’ve gone so far, and can go still further. I feel hatred for you and would love to see him beat you to death; I can still control myself but  …’

Scarcely able to control myself I grabbed her by the waist and forced her to the floor so that she was kneeling before me.

‘Severin!’ she screamed, her face twisted with rage and fear

‘I’ll kill you if you become his wife,’ I threatened, and my voice was hoarse and hollow. ‘You’re mine, I won’t let you go, I love you too much,’ and I was embracing her, forcing her to me, and my right hand involuntarily groped for the dagger that was still sticking in my belt.

Wanda looked at me with a strange, calm, inexplicable expression.

‘I like to see you like this,’ she said steadily, ‘now you are a man and at this moment I know that I still love you.’

‘Wanda  …’ Tears started to my eyes in joy, I bent over her and covered her lovely face with kisses, and then she burst out into loud, mischievous laughter and cried: ‘Have you enough of your ideal now? Are you pleased with me?’

‘What?’ I stammered, ‘You’re not serious?’

‘I am completely serious,’ she continued, ‘I love you, only you and you, you silly little fool, didn’t notice that it was all a joke, a game, and how difficult it was for me to beat you when I would have preferred to take you by the head and kiss you. But surely enough is enough? I played my cruel part much better than you expected, and now you’ll be happy to have your good, nice little wife, who is also quite pretty, I think, back again. We will live quite sensibly now and  …’

‘You, you will be my wife!’ I cried, transported in ecstasy.

‘Yes, your wife, you dear, good man!’ Wanda whispered, kissing my hands.

I drew her to my breast.

‘So, you are no longer my slave Gregor, you are my dear Severin again, my husband.’

‘And him? Don’t you love him?’ I asked, agitated.

‘How could you think that I loved that crude fellow? But, then, you were quite confused, I was worried about you.’

‘I nearly killed myself on account of you.’

‘Really?’ she cried. ‘Oh, I’m still trembling at the thought of your being in the Arno.’

‘But you saved me,’ I said tenderly, ‘you were hovering over the waters, smiling, and your smile drew me back into life.’

*        *        *        *

It is truly a strange feeling to have her in my arms, her head on my breast; I kiss her, and she is smiling. It is as though I have woken from a feverish nightmare, or as though I was shipwrecked, fighting with the waves which threaten to engulf me, and finally I am thrown on to dry land.

‘I hate this town of Florence where you were so unhappy,’ she said as I wished her goodnight, ‘I wish to leave tomorrow. Please be good enough to write a few letters for me whilst I go into town to take my leave. Do you agree?’

‘Of course, my dear, good wife.’

Early next morning she knocked on my door and asked me how I had slept. Her kindness is truly enchanting, and I would never have thought that she could be so gentle.

She’s been away now for four hours; I finished the letters a long time ago and am sitting in the gallery looking down at the street to see if I can spot her carriage in the distance. I am somewhat concerned about her, yet, God knows, I have no cause for doubts or fears. Yet I can’t shake it off and it lies heavily upon me: perhaps it is the sufferings of the last few days which cast their shadows across my soul.

But here she is, radiant with happiness and contentment.

‘Well, did all go according to plan?’ I asked, kissing her hand tenderly.

‘Yes, my love,’ she replied. ‘We are going tonight, help me pack my case.

*        *        *        *

Towards evening she came in person to ask me to go to the post-office and send the letters. I take her carriage and am back in an hour.

‘Madame was asking after you,’ said the negress, smiling, as I climb the wide marble staircase.

‘Was anybody here?’

‘Nobody,’ she replied, and crouched low upon the steps like a black cat.

I walk slowly through the room and am standing before the door of her bedroom.

Why is my heart beating so? Am I not happy?

I open the door quietly and pull back the curtain. Wanda is lying on the ottoman and seems not to notice me. How lovely she is in her robe of silvery grey silk which clings to her splendid figure, revealing her wonderful bust, her beautiful arms. Her hair is tied and interwoven with a black velvet ribbon. A great fire is burning in the hearth and the lamp casts its reddish light: the whole room is swimming in blood.

‘Wanda!’ I exclaimed after a few moments.

‘O Severin!’ she cried joyfully, ‘I have been waiting impatiently for you.’ She jumps up and embraces me; she slips down into the deep pillows and seeks to pull me with her, yet I fall at her feet and bury my head in her lap.

‘Do you know that I love you very much today?’ she murmurs, brushing a few loose hairs from my brow and kissing my eyes.

‘How beautiful your eyes are  …  they have always been your best part, but today they absolutely intoxicate me.

Look I’m expiring  …’ and she stretched her lovely limbs and gazed at me tenderly through her red lashes. ‘And you, how cold you are, you are holding me as though I were a piece of wood  …  Just wait, I’ll make you infatuated!’ she cried, and hung upon my lips, soft and caressing. ‘So, I don’t please you any more  …  I must be cruel to you again, I was too kind today, apparently. Do you know, you silly little man, I think I’ll beat you a little  …’

‘But, darling  …’

‘I want to.’

‘Wanda!’

‘Come, let me tie you up,’ she continued, and ran around the room, mischievously. ‘I want to see you truly in love, do you understand? Here are the ropes. I wonder if I can still do it?’

She began tying my feet, then she tied my hands firmly behind my back and then bound my arms like a prisoner.

‘So,’ she said, serene and eager, ‘can you move?’

‘No.’

‘Good.’

She made a lasso of a strong piece of rope, threw it over my head and drew it down to my hips; she pulled it tight and tied me to a pillar.

‘I have the feeling that I am being executed,’ I said quietly.

‘You’re going to get a real whipping today again,’ cried Wanda.

‘But, please,’ I said, ‘put on the fur jacket.’

‘Well, I can give you that pleasure,’ she replied, brought forth the jacket and slipped it on, smiling; then she stood there, her arms crossed on her breast and gazed at me, her eyes half closed.

‘Do you know the story of the Ox of Dionys?’ she asked.

‘Only vaguely  …  What is it?’

‘One of the courtiers dreamed up this new torture-instrument for the despot of Syracuse, an ox made of iron in which they would place the condemned man before putting the whole thing into the fire. When the iron ox began to glow red-hot the prisoner inside would start to scream, and his agony sounded like the roaring of an ox. Dionys smiled graciously at the inventor and in order to make the first demonstration forced the courtier inside his own invention. This is a very useful precept. It was you, you see, who inoculated me with selfishness, arrogance and cruelty and so
you shall be my first victim.
I really find pleasure in having a human being who thinks, feels and succumbs to my power, particularly a man who is physically and mentally stronger than I am, in order to ill-treat him, and above all a man who loves me.’

‘To distraction!’ I cried.

‘All the better,’ she said, ‘and you’ll find all the more pleasure in that which is about to happen to you.’

‘What is wrong?’ I asked. ‘I don’t understand you, there really seems to be a cruel gleam in your eyes, and you are strangely beautiful, like Venus in Furs  …’

Without answering she put her arms about my neck and kissed me. At this moment I was seized again with the full madness of my passion.

‘Well, where is the whip?’ I asked.

Wanda took two steps backward, and laughed.

‘You really want to be beaten?’ she cried, tossing her head back proudly

‘Yes!’

Suddenly Wanda’s face changed, twisted in anger, and for a second she seemed almost ugly.

‘Beat him, Alexis!’ she screamed.

At that moment the handsome Greek thrust his head between the curtains of the four-poster bed. I was struck dumb, rigid. The situation was extremely comical and I would have laughed aloud if it had not been at the same time so desperately sad and shameful for me. And my blood ran cold when my rival stepped forth in his riding boots, his tight white trousers, his close-fitting velvet coat, and my glance fell on his athletic body.

‘You are cruel, indeed,’ he said, turning to Wanda.

‘I am only a hedonist’ she replied with a wild sense of humour. ‘Only pleasure makes life worthwhile; only the one who enjoys life departs unwillingly from it; he who suffers and pines greets death as a friend. He who wishes to enjoy life must accept it serenely, as the ancients did: he must not fear to enjoy life at others’ expense, he must never show pity and must yoke others like animals before his carriage, his plough, others who feel, who would fain enjoy life – he must make them his slaves, he must exploit them for his own ends, his own pleasure, without remorse; he must not ask whether they are suffering, or whether they will perish. He must always remember this: if I were in
their
hands they would do the same, and
I
would have to pay with my sweat, my blood, for their souls delight. That was the world of the Ancients; pleasure and cruelty, freedom and bondage went hand in hand. Those who wished to live as Olympian gods
had
to have slaves whom they could fling into their fishponds and gladiators who would fight whilst they themselves ate opulent meals and never worried if they were sprayed with spurting blood.’

Her words brought me fully to my senses. ‘Let me loose!’ I screamed angrily.

‘Are you not my slave, my property?’ Wanda retorted. ‘Shall I show you our agreement?’

‘Let me free!’ I threatened, ‘otherwise –’ I tore at the bonds.

‘Can he break free?’ she asked. ‘He’s threatened to kill me.’

‘Don’t worry,’ the Greek replied, inspecting the knots.

‘I’ll scream for help,’ I continued.

‘Nobody will hear you,’ said Wanda, ‘and nobody will stop me from abusing your noblest feelings and playing a frivolous game with you  …’ She continued to speak with a diabolical contempt, repeating the phrases of my letter. ‘Do you now find me simply cruel and merciless, or am I about to become
common
’? Tell me, do you still love me, or are you starting to hate me, to despise me? Take the whip  …’ and she gave it to the Greek who quickly stepped up to me.

‘Don’t you dare!’ I yelled, trembling with rage, ‘I won’t take anything from
you
!’

‘You’re only saying that because I’m not wearing fur,’ the Greek replies, smiling frivolously, and picking his short sable jacket from the bed.

‘You are divine!’ Wanda cried, kissing him and helping him into the fur.

‘May I really whip him?’ he asked.

‘Do whatever you want with him.’

‘You beast!’ I shouted.

The Greek fixed me with his cold eyes, like a tiger and tried out the whip; his muscles rippled as he cracked it, whilst I was tied there like Marsyas and was forced to watch Apollo preparing to skin me.

I looked around the room and fixed my gaze on the ceiling where Samson was being blinded at Delilah’s feet. The picture now seemed a symbol or eternal parable of passion, of lust, of the love of man for woman. ‘Each of us is essentially a Samson,’ I thought, ‘and will be betrayed by the woman he loves, whether she’s wearing a homespun bodice or sable.’

‘Now watch, Wanda, how I’m going to discipline him,’ said the Greek. He bared his teeth and his face assumed that bloodthirsty expression that had terrified me the first time I saw him.

And he began to whip me, so ruthlessly, so dreadfully that I flinched at every blow, my whole body shuddering with pain, with tears pouring down my cheeks, whilst Wanda lay in her fur jacket on the ottoman, her head on her hand: she watched with cruel curiosity, her whole body shaking with laughter.

The feeling of being ill treated by a rival before the woman one worships is indescribable: I almost expired with shame and desperation.

And the most shameful thing was, that in my wretched helplessness, beneath Apollo’s whip and the laughter of Venus, I felt a kind of fantastic, supersensory titillation – but Apollo soon beat this out of me, blow by blow, until I finally bit my teeth in impotent rage and cursed myself, my lubricious fantasies, women and love.

With a fearful clarity I suddenly saw where blind passion, where lust could lead a man, since the days of Holofernes and Agamemnon – into the sack, the net, the hands of a treacherous woman, into misery, subjection, death.

It was as though I had woken from a dream.

My blood was already spurting beneath his lashes, I was writhing like a worm which one stamps upon, but he continued to beat me, to whip me mercilessly, and she kept on laughing, mercilessly, as she closed the packed suitcases and slipped into her travelling furs; she was still laughing as she went down the stairs on his arm and got into the carriage.

Then it was still for a moment.

I listened, breathless.

The carriage door slammed shut, the horses started, the wheels rolled – then all was silent.

Extracts from
Venus im Pelz. Mit einer Studie über

den Masochismus von Gilles Deleuze..

Insel Taschenbuch 469.

Rocking back and forward in his armchair while he manicured his fingernails, he found it pleasantly titillating to imagine the girl – she had not even told him her name – clinging to him under the blossoming apple trees as a gentle breeze wafted over them, or in the evening, gliding homewards over the water, her quivering body pressed against his in the narrow boat. ‘Tant pis pour elle’, he said as he stood up, throwing the nail-scissors in an arc towards the table. ‘I’m not running after her. There are plenty more like that.’