Tales of Hoffmann (Penguin Classics)
R. J. Hollingdale
Language: English
Pages: 416
ISBN: 0140443924
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
E T A Hoffmann studied law and entered the Prussian civil service, but his over-riding ambition was to become a graphic artist and painter. This selection of his finest short stories vividly demonstrates his intense imagination and preoccupation with the supernatural, placing him at the forefront of both surrealism and the modern horror genre.
Michele Steno. Falieri was not wrong in attributing the deed to Steno himself. Driven from the Doge’s balcony, he had run home, written the malicious doggerel and, when all eyes were focused on the firework display, had left the scrap of paper on the Doge’s throne, after which he had slipped away, again unobserved. It was a cunning plot intended to wound both Doge and Dogaressa at their most sensitive. Michele freely admitted his authorship, but he placed the blame squarely on the Doge himself,
with all kinds of childish tricks and have the presumption to intend loving the Demoiselle Albertine yourself and have painted the lady’s portrait on glass and by means of a laterna magica hidden under your cloak projected that lovely image on to the Town Hall tower! Oh, my dear sir, I too know all about such things, and if you think your tricks and coarse speeches can make me back down you are barking up quite the wrong tree!’ ‘Take care,’ the goldsmith responded calmly with a curious smile,
drew a number of unflattering caricatures of the leading personalities of Posen, including the commandant of the military garrison, General von Zastrow. The general failed to see the humour of it and protested to Berlin about Hoffmann’s continuing presence; as a consequence, Hoffmann was re-posted to the village of Plozk on the Vistula – a demotion he regarded as a virtual banishment. Before leaving Posen, however, he married a Polish girl, Michaelina Trzynska. He spent four years at Plozk;
as I was about to start on my work, Cardillac came up to me with rage and scorn in his eyes. “I no longer need your work,” he began. “Get out of this house within the hour, and don’t let me see you again. I need not tell you why I cannot have you here any longer. The fruit you desire is out of reach!” I was about to speak, but he set on me with his fists and threw me out of doors, so that I stumbled and injured my head and arm. ‘Shocked, confused by the pain, I left the house and eventually
corpse. – What happened, boy? Say without fear.” – “Right in front of me,” I said, “a man jumped out on to him, stabbed him, and ran away with lightning speed just as I cried out. I wanted to see if he could still be saved.” – “No, my son,” cried one of those who had lifted the body, “he’s finished, stabbed through the heart, as usual.” – “The Devil!” said another. “Again we are too late, as we were the day before yesterday” – and with that they went off with the body. ‘How I felt I really