XXXII
In 1915, Inez Rodde weds Helmut Institoris. They settle down in a fancy apartment, where Z. soon becomes a frequent guest. He skeptically observes Inez’s attempts to maintain a bourgeois household amidst the instability and uncertainty of the War period. One evening, Inez confesses her love of Rudi Schwerdtfeger to him.
Time of composition: November 9–29, 1945. Time of narration: After April 1944. Narrated time: 1915–1918.
| “Pay heed before you wed for aye.” | The German original, Drum prüfe wer sich ewig bindet, is a quotation from Friedrich Schiller’s 1799 poem “Song of the Bell.” |
| low building […] across from the Schweigestill’s courtyard | This is based on an actual house in Polling (the real-world model for Pfeiffering), to which TM’s mother Julia Mann moved in old age. |
| during the sparsest years | During the First World War, as well as perhaps the hyperinflationary period of 1922–1923. |
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| | A female servant who assists with matters of personal toilette. |
| for a world, so to speak, as it had been, not as it would become | Inez is trying against all odds to preserve a bourgeois form of life that the outbreak of the war has already rendered superannuated. |
| une jeune fille accomplie | French: “an accomplished young girl.” |
| | Käthe Kruse (1883–1968) was a world-famous dollmaker. |
| I had rented a room in Schwabing | Z.’s decision to rent a bachelor pad in Munich may well be driven by convenience, but his choice of address also places him close to the English Garden which, as the queer studies scholar Robert Tobin has pointed out, was and is a noted gay cruising area. |
| | A Munich artist’s association and social club, of which TM’s father-in-law Alfred Pringsheim was a member. |
| “Vengeance is the Lord’s” | Romans 12:19. The German actually quotes from Deuteronomy 32:35, with its very similar wording: “To me belongeth vengeance and recompense.” Both quotations seem rather harsh given the context and reveal Z. at his most priggish. |