Blog III: “A Difficult Reconciliation” (Short Story Part I)

Preface to the Story: 

When the protagonist Thomas receives an unexpected letter from a close friend, he finds himself struggling to process its contents and unable to reconcile what he reads with what he thought he knew. 

“A Difficult Reconciliation" is based on actual historical events. It is inspired by the close friendship between German writer Thomas Mann (1875-1955) and American journalist Agnes Meyer (1887-1970). Spanning two decades, the two shared numerous letters between the late 1930s and mid 1950s.

Thomas, the famous German novelist, who lived in LA now, was feeling sick, the stomach as usual when he was confronted with stress, especially with unexpected stress like this afternoon when he opened the letter from his friend Agnes Meyer. Usually, he was looking forward to her communications with their unique mixture of news from the world of American politics, information about her family, and very personal notes expressing her devotion to his work and his person. Ever since he had left Europe and moved to America, she had been his well-connected and influential patron. Many of her letters were written in his native German, though with obvious disregard of rules of spelling and punctuation. That made them even more personal and in a special way endearing. Her last letter, however, was different. It was an open and very personal attack. His initial reaction was disbelief. There must be some misunderstanding. It took him a while until he realized that his mildly critical remarks about Paul Claudel had deeply upset her. And she had taken sides. She defended Claudel’s sympathies for authoritarian regimes like Franco’s Spain, which made no sense at all in 1943, during a global war when the liberal democracies were under deadly attack from right-wing regimes all over the world. And this defense of Catholicism turned into an attack on him as the representative of moralist Protestantism. He decided to put the letter aside, turning his attention to the next letter on the pile, but the strategy failed completely. The last line of her letter stuck in his mind. It turned into an odd sensation in his stomach, a feeling of a strange pressure, making it harder to breathe, not much but enough to be unpleasant. This was not a good sign, possibly the beginning of a more serious and painful illness. That would be a really bad time for a disruption of his normal daily schedule, the writing process in the morning and attention to the numerous letters and his other public obligations in the afternoon. Of course, she must have known this, realized how much her missive would interfere with his work, the very work that she claimed to admire and cherish so much. How could she do this, this reckless interruption of his life in Pacific Palisades?

            He stood up from his desk chair and walked over to the window, hoping that the movement would make the pain go away. But that did not happen. There was still the same pressure in the area of his stomach. After standing in front of the window for some time, he realized that his gaze had been empty, he was still preoccupied with the disturbing letter. What triggered her extreme response? Paul Claudel was a close and cherished friend of hers of whom she was very protective, but that alone could not be the cause for her rage. The French writer, it seemed, was only the occasion for something much bigger and deeper. It must have been brewing there, waiting for an opportunity to come out and hit him like a heavy brick. I must have hurt her feelings unknowingly, he thought, trusting that she understands my complicated situation in this country, a political refugee and writer cut off from his native language. I have counted on her, he muttered, while he turned around and slowly walked back to his desk without sitting down. Indeed, his entire set-up here in California, the house, the financial support system, he owed to her. It was a delicate situation. His existence and that of his family had initially depended on her. He owed gratitude and was willing to let her know how much he appreciated her generosity. But there was at the same time a delicate point, the awareness of his continued dependence, the sense that she controlled his life, that she demanded to be part of his life in ways that could become oppressive. These were feelings he did not like to admit and he had tried hard never to express them in his numerous letters to her.

He stood in front of his desk, motionless, listening to the noises coming from the front entrance of the house. It appeared that his wife Katja had returned from a shopping trip. He heard her voice, she was talking to a third person whom he could not identify. Sooner or later he would have to talk to her about Agnes’ letter. There was so much at stake. His response would determine Katja’s life as well. She was tough, much tougher than he had ever imagined, as he had found out when they became refugees in 1933 overnight because of Hitler. Still, she had always been used to affluence. She came from a very wealthy Munich family, a princess in need of protection. From her perspective, their present living arrangements were adequate but not up to the former standards of her own family. He had to control his emotions, there was no room for a quick answer, responding to her anger filled with his own anger. He had to put the letter aside, turning his attention to other matters until he had calmed down, at least enough to discuss the matter with Katja later today.

It was 2:00 am the following night, when he woke up from an unpleasant dream. He had found himself in the classroom of his school in Lübeck, his hometown, sitting at his desk feeling completely unprepared for the exercises in Latin. The teacher stood in front of the class, calling out names of students who had to demonstrate that they were able to translate Livius. He was hoping that he would not be called, but then he heard his name. It was his moment to prove himself, but he failed completely. He was unable to utter a single word. But now the voice of the teacher changed. It became a female voice chiding him in English. He knew that the voice was angry with him, but he could not understand what she was saying. He felt like crawling under the desk; all he wanted to do was to disappear, not to be reminded of his failure. Then he woke up, confused, trying to make sense of the dream. No doubt, the voice had been Agnes’ voice, a demanding and dominating voice, reminding him relentlessly of his duties as an American citizen during the war. His dry throat was hurting a bit, he needed a glass of water and grasped for the bottle of Selzer water on the night stand without turning on the light. Some way he managed to fill the glass. The cold water relieved the hurt for a moment. He laid down again, his eyes wide open, staring at the dark ceiling. He did not want to disturb Katja whose soft breathing he heard next to him. He had not talked to her about the letter as he had intended. Katja had clearly noticed his changed mood when they had dinner and had asked him. But he had been evasive, claiming that his worries were related to the new project, the novel about the modern composer he had mentioned before. He had even explained some of the technical difficulties, among them the need for a narrator who is at the same time the biographer of the artist and the commentator of contemporary German history. But why had he been evasive, why had he delayed the inevitable discussion about Agnes Meyer? He knew that it would have been better for both of them. He did not have a clear answer. There were so many angles and not all of them could he easily explain to Katja. She realized of course how much his family owed to Agnes, especially in the beginning when they moved from Zurich to the States and settled in Princeton. This was very different from the previous lecture tours. With Agnes’ help, they found a new financial base. This was easy to explain, since Katja had a very clear and accurate understanding of their difficult financial situation, given that their grown children, especially Klaus, were not as independent as they should be. More complicated was Agnes’s role as an admirer and devotee of his work, which included the expectation of a special, even unique bond between them. Agnes, as he had found out, was not willing to accept the boundaries that Katja would approve or at least could live with. The most difficult part was the admission that Agnes had become part of his work. He had shared thoughts and feelings with her that he had not shared with anybody else. He had paid a price for this artistic intimacy. She could be very demanding, disregarding the limits of a civilized friendship that was based on tacitly acknowledged boundaries. When she did not like his public lectures, she insisted that he rewrite them, arguing that he could do better. Sometimes it felt like being in school again. He had not been ready to talk with Katja about the letter. She would have pointed out that she had warned him, that there was a dark side to Agnes, emotional turmoil threatening to disrupt personal relationships. He would have replied that the his family still needed Agnes’s generous support. The income from his books still did not guarantee the lifestyle Katja was used to, although things had greatly improved when Joseph in Egypt had been chosen by the Book of the Month Club. This was an argument that she immediately understood. Still, financial considerations were not, as he conceded to himself,  the most pressing ones. When he thought about the new project, the Faustus novel, he also thought of Agnes. She would be the ideal translator. Her command of German was better than Mrs. Lowe’s and her grasp of his work far superior. He had not yet approached her, since he had not yet even finished a chapter.

Thomas tried to get back to sleep, closing his eyes while listening to the noises around him. For a brief moment, he heard the engine of a distant car, then there was only the ticking of his alarm clock and Katja’s quiet breathing. After lying for half an hour on his back without falling asleep, he decided to get up.

[End of Part I]

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