XXVI
A year has passed since Z. began writing his biography, and German military defeats are multiplying. German cities are routinely being bombed and even a large-scale invasion across the English Channel by Allied forces no longer seems out of the question. Back in 1912, L. returns from his Italian journey and takes up residence at the Schweigestill farm.
Time of composition: April 12, 1945–May 16, 1945. Time of narration: April 1944. Narrated time: 1912–1913.
| | While Z. has been working on his biography for a year, his real-life creator took two years for the same task. By April 1945 the Second World War was in its last days; Germany’s unconditional surrender took place on May 8, 1945. |
| | A real-life hotel in which TM lived from September to October 1902. |
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| attack on our European castello | The Normandy landings (D-Day) took place on June 6, 1944. |
| | Latin: “always the same.” Compare Z.’s reference to the nunc stans, or “static now” of Kaisersaschern on 39/57. |
| a dialect form of the even more archaic | The original characterizes the dialect as having “stood still in the Old German,” which emphasizes the general sense of stasis highlighted by this passage (the German term Waltpurgis uses is stat). Another example of the theme of mythic repetition. |
| | Most German editions have “nineteen years.” Woods corrects an inconsistency in TM’s chronology. |
| a metal whistle whose tone was adjustable by a screw | Thus a primitive flute, which provides another example of the incantatory power of music. Compare also the story of Orpheus and Cerberus in the tenth book of the Metamorphoses (8 CE) by Ovid (43 BCE–17 CE). |
| the dramatist Richard Voss | The poet Richard Voss (1851–1918) does indeed relate such an episode in his memoirs. |
| easy communication with the capital | Freising is located roughly 10 miles northeast of Munich |