"HEART OF GLASS" "I Iook into the distance, to the end of the world." "Before the day is over, the end will come." "First, time will tumble, and then the earth." "The clouds will begin to race the earth boils over; this is the sign." "This is the beginning of the end." "The world's edge begins to crumble everything starts to collapse tumbIes, falls, crumbles and collapses." "I Iook into the cataract." "I feel an undertow, it draws me, it sucks me down." "I begin to fall a vertigo seizes upon me." "Now I Iook at one spot in the tumbling waters." "I seek one spot on which my eyes can rest." "I become light, lighter, lighter." "Everything becomes light, I fly upwards." "Out of the falling and the flying, a new land arises." "Like the submerged atlantis, the earth rises out of the waters." "I see a new earth." "Come here, don't be afraid." "Come here, I said." "The Giant has eyes like miII-stones." "Fingers like tree branches." "His nose is a boulder." "The village lives in fear;" "Rup says he's seen a Giant." "The time of the Giants is coming back." "The Giant breaks the trees and slays our cattle and tears out our guts if he sees us." "He is sucking out our brains." "tell Rup there are no Giants." "Next time he should note the position of the sun." "The sun was low and the Giant was just a shadow of a dwarf." "If nothing changes, you think that's a blessing." "But I see a fire and I see the glass factory." "And I'II tell you something else..." "A liar will cross one of the bridges, a thief will cross the other." "Tomorrow you will be finished, AscherI!" "I'II sleep off my hangover on your corpse." "Innkeeper, bring Wudy another beer." "I'II sleep on your corpse." "Hias said that I'II sleep on your corpse." "Hias sees into the future." "Provided we sleep in the hay." "And I must fall down onto the threshing place first." "Then you must fall on me." "If you don't fall soft, you'II be dead, too." "MühIbeck is dead and no one knows the secret of the Ruby glass." "He knew how to write." "He could have easily written it down." "How the Ruby glass is made." "Have you ever written a word?" "But MühIbeck could have talked, MühIbeck could." "My God..." "The second glass." "This splendor is now relinquished from the world." "Now what will protect me now from the evil of the universe?" "You wouldn't dare." "I would." "Father, have you seen AdaIbert?" "Naked in bed again." "Get dressed!" "glass has a fragile soul." "It is unstained." "A crack is the Sin;" "after the Sin, there is no sound." "will the future see the necessary faII of the factories just as we see the ruined fortress as a sign of inevitable change?" "people say that Hias has seen nettIes springing out of the factories." "The lilac bushes will pine for the company of men, they say." "The Ruby must save us." "Tear MühIbeck's house down, look for the secret in every crevice." "Dig three feet into the earth on which his house stood for MühIbeck could have buried his secret." "Bring me the green davenport that he gave to his mother, AnamirI!" "The chaos of the stars makes my head ache." "The master does not want his breakfast now." "LudmiIIa may wear her hair down today." "Yes, she may wear her hair down." "A favor for the servant." "Father, gIass-bIower GigI thinks he has the secret of the Ruby glass." "This is the day to stand up." "No, I'd sooner stay in my chair." "I feel as though my backbone had crumbled." "Your backbone is not soft." "You won't collapse like a heap of stones." "For twelve years you have been sitting in this chair." "For twelve years I have shown you your shoes." "I'II have you carried, as usual." "Are you sure?" "Is this really Ruby glass?" "That's supposed to be Ruby?" "Another one." "should I leave this place?" "Madness is rampant in the village." "The factory owner wants a new furnace, but there are no builders." "suddenly, I see a fire flowing in the brook and the wind pushing the fire on." "I see the trees burning like matchsticks." "I see many people running up a hill." "breathless, they stop at the top and, paralyzed, they turn to stone, one beside the other." "A whole forest of stone." "Then it becomes dark and still." "Down below, everything has perished." "There is no man, no house, only some debris." "Yes, and then I see someone running on the road below with a burning branch in his hand crying: "Am I really the Iast one, the only one left?"" "Send for the herdsman Hias; that he may see the mystery of the Ruby glass." "Even if we must tear MühIbeck from his grave so that Hias can read his brain." "How strange, a whole town made of glass with people living in it." "How can people live in glass houses?" "Here's the church made of glass." "animals live in the church all kinds of animals:" "hares, chickens, deer birds, cows but there are no people in the church." "The streets are deserted." "Everything is covered in snow." "Let it be; there is more to break today." "Leave the mansion." "The master could slip and end up sitting on your face." "Why the sniveling?" "Better that the servant prays for us to find the secret of the Ruby." "So much will happen, Hias is outside." "already?" "He knew?" "He didn't need a messenger?" "Master, please send a hunter to slay the bear." "The bulls are frightened and Sam and I can't promise that he won't kill a bull or cause a stampede." "On the day of the bear, a bull will run as far as Mainz." "MühIbeck is dead." "He has taken his secret with him." "MühIbeck abandoned us, but you are to see the secret of the Ruby." "I don't know the ingredient." "You know it for ten florins." "Then you know it for a thousand." "Do you want our people to eat oatmeal bread again that gives them headaches?" "Then tell me the secret so we can make Ruby glass again;" "you can become foreman." "And I will carry a millstone to Trier." "I've only come because of the hunter." "I want the Ruby again." "I want the red glass, understand?" "I need a glass to contain my blood, or it will trickle away." "The sun is hurting me." "You will never see the sun again." "Rats will bite your ear lobes." "Wudy is dead." "No, AscherI is the one who has been nabbed." "Hias predicted that the one underneath faIIs first." "And look, the other falls on top of him, he faIIs softly." "Wudy survived it." "Let's separate them." "The one whose arm falls first is the dead man." "Don't curse in the face of the dead." "Now we know." "What Hias foresees, happens." "It's Toni." "You buried our foreman, MühIbeck, the week before last." "Now they do not know what to do." "Hias predicted it." "You know about the Ruby glass?" "The Ruby is the master's malady." "The davenport is here." "Bring it in." "I'm delighted with this letter." "AdaIbert, give me the Ietter-opener." "We'II read this message." "Can he decipher that?" "If a letter reaches someone with the words scattered around it should make you think." "Are you going up to the woods again?" "I do not need the flour now." "I see that I only get away when the snow lies." "I'II put it back, then." "Your MühIbeck is dead..." "They have taken away your davenport." "Yes, he always sat there." "When night falls, the faces will die." "By day the rain pours yet the land is drying up." "You have been invited because you describe the Ruby so beautifully." "I cannot hear enough of it." "The land of the Ruby... my land." "And all the people..." "dance in the red glow and live in it." "Their blood, their life, everything is in the glass." "In the red, in the color." "This land is the only one." "Everything is in this land and everything is Ruby." "Your prayer has worked a miracle." "For an hour, I have known something I never knew." "I can sell my secret to all gIassworks." "Break all you can." "I shall take ten loads of Ruby glass to Mt." "Arber and thrown into the lake, so it is dyed red." "AdaIbert, did you understand?" "The lake is dyed red." "The glass for the lake must go this very day." "Take everything from the store." "And another thing." "Re-stuff the davenport and mend it and take it to AnamirI with ten florins for compensation." "tell her I no Ionger wish her dead MühIbeck to go to the devil." "May he be surrounded by a host of angels." "I have it." "It is here." "Here." "And inside here..." "We all..." "I have already sent for the PIössberg furnace builders." "The mistress will be surprised when she returns." "She will see nothing left standing." "Lunatic." "When she dismounts, she will faII into the mud." "And you'II be on a boat, puking." "Anything else?" " will there be any free beer today?" " Yes." "The master is deranged." "And in the glassworks there's been BeeIzebub." "He sent out ten men with racks of glass  but they were not so stupid as to throw valuable glass in the lake." "They will smuggle it over the border and sell it." "LudmiIIa, go before he wants something from you." "LudmiIIa, make yourself beautiful;" "the master wants your company." "I must provide some music." "In the meadow there will be someone who can play the hurdy-gurdy." "But I will have to sing with it." "Harp-Tony is in the inn." "tell him to come, it will be to his advantage." "Now you have a soft seat again." "The night is coming on slowly today." "It creeps into the village and in the stables people softly cuddle with the animals." "In the factory they are working again against fear but they know that their work is in vain." "I told them the factory will burn down in the night." "But, Iike sIeep-waIkers, people walk towards their doom." "Then the little one starts a war and the big one across the ocean extinguishes it." "Then you will not get a loaf for two hundred florins." "Then a strict master comes who takes people's shirts and their skin with them." "After the War you think there will be Peace, but there will not be." "Drink up." "I miss AscherI!" "You should not have smothered him." "I miss AscherI!" "He should have been here today." "Can't you go out to him?" "He cannot come inside." "Bring me some AscherI!" "Even if I believe all that you say, I do not believe that." "believe it or not, that is your affair." "I tell you what I see;" "I do not know if it will happen." "And then?" "The peasants will dress like towns people and the towns people will be like apes." "Women will wear trousers and boots." "The peasants will stand in their dung heaps with polished boots." "The peasants will eat cakes and discuss politics." "Who will play for us?" "I will play for these two." "Keep playing!" "They all fight;" "there is war in every house." "No man will like another man." "The elegant and fine people will be murdered." "He who has smooth hands will be slain." "The peasants will encircle their houses with a high fence and shoot at the towns people from their windows." "The towns people will beg;" "let me plough the ground but they will be slain." "No man will like another man." "If two people are on one bench and one asks the other to move over and the other does not, it will be his death." "That will be the time of the clearing of the Benches." "She is cooling off, then she will not crack any more." "That is the pure ingredient." "What are factories still good for?" "PauIin must dance naked on the table!" "You will not be able to tell between summer and winter." "Everyone will have a different head and the forest will get sparse, Iike the beggar's gown." "The small will be tall again." "When the Redcoats come with their red coats then you must run fast and take a loaf of bread with you." "Whoever has three loaves and drops one on the way, must not stoop." "Even if you loose the second one, you must leave it behind you can subsist with one loaf because it does not last long." "The few who survive must have an iron head." "people become ill but no one can help them." "Those who will survive will stick together and call each other Brother and Sister." " Take everything off." " So we can see something!" "The factory is on fire!" "The factory is on fire!" "If it is burning, I would Iike to be there, where are my shoes?" "For twelve years there has been no fire." "And my shoes are gone." "people settle down as though never wanting to leave this world." "But over night the clearing of the world begins." "From the Orient, a huge bird appears and shits into the sea." "The sea rises as high as a house, and boils." "The earth trembles and a big island half drowns." "The big city with the iron tower is in flames but the fire was started by its own men, and the city is leveled." "In italy the clergy is killed and the churches collapse." "The Pope sits in a cell." "During his flight he consecrates a goat as bishop." "people starve." "The three days of darkness draw nearer." "Where the black box drops, a green and yellow dust arises." "The weather will change." "Vineyards will be grown here and there is fruit that I do not know." "LudmiIIa lies dead in the master's office and Toni plays her one song after another on his harp." "Hias has wished this calamity on us." "I merely predicted it." "He has devil's eyes, he has the evil Eye." "Lock him up!" "I do not see any more." "It is so dark." "I must see something again." "I must go to the woods." "I want to see the woods again." "Don't you want to see any people?" "I Iike you." "You have a heart of glass." "And now I'm going to roast the bear." "In the night someone looks across the forest and sees not a single light." "And when he sees a juniper bush in the twilight he runs to see if it isn't a human being, there are so few left." "In the forest, roosters crow, but the people have perished." "Something else occurs to me." "I see it again." "A coachman stops and gets down from his coach he knocks down on the ground with his whip and says:" ""There was once the big town of Straubing."" "Now I see the rocky island again." "I see it quite clearly." "A rocky island far out in the sea, and a second, smaller island." "They lie on the far edge of the inhabited world." "On one island, for centuries, some forgotten men have lived." "And because they live on the far edge of the inhabited world word has not reached them that the earth is round." "They have retained the belief that the earth is flat and that the ocean far beyond ends in a yawning abyss." "I see a man on top of the rock." "For years he stood alone, looking out over the sea day after day, always in the same place." "He is the first one to doubt." "Then, years later, three other men join him." "For many years they gaze across the sea from the rock." "Then, one day, they decide to risk the ultimate." "They want to reach the edge of the world, to see if there is really an abyss." "Musicians accompany their departure." "Then the men set out, pathetic and senseless." "In a boat that is far too small." "It may have seemed like a sign of hope that the birds followed them out into the vastness of the sea."