| | TM himself lived in Palestrina with his brother Heinrich (1871–1950) for part of the summer 1895, and again for several visits between 1896 and 1898. As Z. already indicates, the town is most famous as the birthplace of the composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525–1594), a master of polyphonic composition. In choosing his vacation spot, L. is signaling his intention to devote himself to the study of early modern music. |
| breed of little black pigs | |
| | Signora Manardi’s physical description resembles that of L.’s mother and of Elsa Schweigestill. Together, these three mother-types are symbolically associated with the Virgin Mary in the Christological scheme of DF. |
| | The feeble-minded Amelia possibly foreshadows L.’s later syphilitic madness. |
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| | Italian: “distinguished foreigners.” |
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| | Cigarettes that have been properly taxed by the Italian state. Here as throughout these pages Z. is using superfluous Italian terms to show off his cosmopolitanism and erudition. |
| | Italian: “wine fortifies the blood.” |
| | As is usually the case (see e.g., 6/12 or 12/20) Z.’s encomia to classical antiquity seemingly unintentionally conclude on a demonic note. |
| | Another reference to 179/246. |
| scene set in Armado’s house | Love’s Labour’s Lost I, 2 |
| | Z. projects onto Shakespeare’s play notions of jealousy and romantic rivalry, which may be indicative of his own feelings about Schildknapp, but also foreshadows the latter love triangle involving L., Schwerdtfeger, and Marie Godeau. |
| dark lady of the second sonnet series | The “Dark Lady” (so-called because of her hair color, not because of any association with the “dark arts”) is a poetic persona that occurs in Shakespeare’s sonnets 127–52. As Z. already notes, she too is part of a love triangle. |
| begot in the ventricle […] womb of pia mater | Shakespeare’s anatomical correlative to the creative process anticipates the devil’s description of L.’s syphilitic infection in XXV. The pia mater (Latin: “tender mother”—an epithet also commonly applied to the Virgin Mary) is the innermost of three membranes that envelop the brain and spinal cord. Meningeal syphilis causes the formation of swollen masses of tissue (“gumma”) on the pia mater. |
| “He who seeketh hard things […]” | Not from the Letter to the Hebrews but actually Luther’s translation of the second half of Proverbs 25:27. |
| | Another example of the thematic opposition between “culture” and “barbarism.” TM translates the Shakespearean term “study” as Bildung (= humanist education), making this connection even more evident. |
| | In Love’s Labour’s Lost I, 1. |
| weary of Romantic democracy | The link between Romanticism and democracy is somewhat unorthodox, though very characteristic of TM ever since his 1922 lecture “On the German Republic.” |
| esoteric spirit […] exaggerated itself as parody | This formulation touches on both Wendell Kretzschmar’s thoughts about Beethoven’s late style and TM’s own opinions about modernist literature. |
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| | TM’s own address during his stays in Rome in 1895 and 1896–98. |
| that neither had ever touched a woman | Another instance of the theme of homosexuality and homosociality that pervades the novel. |
| | A “roué” is a rake, a man devoted to sensual pleasure. |
| | Latin: “do not touch me.” See John 20:17. |