Saturday, February 5:
The children’s voices delight R., and he says about Fidi, “He is a pure nightingale.” Then he reverts merrily to the “silly theme,” saying: “That a person like Beethoven wrote such a silly melody! And what we clearly see in it is some animal pretending to be stupid.” [This last sentence was obliterated in ink by an unknown hand.] Since my toothache is still troubling me, and I am keeping silent about it, R. inquires, “The Napoleon of toothache?” He writes, and since that is happening upstairs, “in the fresh air,” as he says, he comes to fetch me for lunch. He talks about Gob.’s Les Pléiades, which he says is somewhat immature but contains some nice passages.
Delight in Fidi over coffee: because of his carpentry work his hands are full of blisters and calluses, but he does not complain and allows a callus to be cut off without any flinching. Then a book arrives which I ordered for yesterday (R.’s day), Hederich’s Real-Lexikon. The article on opera which R. thought was in it is not there, but there are other articles which he also remembers, and which are really indescribable, such as Lais and Thais.
Our reading leads to a discussion about German literature and how the great intellects fashioned everything for themselves. We go for a walk; the cold is again severe, the hares are proved right, and R. seizes the occasion to remark on the unity of Nature, which takes precautions of this kind. In the morning we also talked about the superiority of animals, if only on account of their fur, whereas poor humans have their posture and gait impeded by heavy clothing.
Over coffee R. also talked about Count Tyskiewicz, who once accompanied R. to Die Zauberflöte and found it all so poor and childish; in contrast he mentioned the friendship duet in the first act of La Vestale - that really was something, he said. This declamatory French manner of haranguing reminded R. yesterday of the election meeting he attended in Paris in ’49, where he heard the seven Montagnards, all of whom spoke excellently.
In the evening, Hederich again: the articles on Aspasia, tragedy, and drama, also Pericles, to our great amusement. Then R. asks me what Shakespeare we should read, and I beg for the scene between Henry IV and his son at the King’s death. We do not regret our choice, and are lost in emotion and admiration over practically everything: the language, which R. describes as official and heavy at times, but always natural; the initial behavior of the Prince, no grief at the death of his father, exactly as in the previous scene, but then his emotional response to his father’s words; and the King, too, just mouthing words of wisdom after having been so moving: all of it the simple truth, like Nature itself. We also look for the passage in which the King sighs, wishing that one might read the book of fate, because we had been reminded of it in the palace gardens. “Everything is terrible, and if one never achieves an enlightened glimpse of freedom, the whole of life is not worth very much.”