Metropolis ~ Chapter 23
From 'Metropolis - New Translation'
This piece is part of my ongoing translation of the novel of Thea von Harbou’s “Metropolis”. If you’d like to find out more about the project and see other chapters, check out the essay below:
"Beloved!" said Freder, the son of Joh Fredersen.
It was the softest and most cautious call that a human voice is capable of. But Maria answered it with as little as she had answered the despair-filled shouts of the man who loved her and wished to re-awaken her to consciousness of herself.
She lay upon the steps of the high altar, stretched out slenderly and motionlessly, her head in Freder's arm, her hands in Freder's hand, and the gentle fire of the lofty church windows burning upon her quite white face and upon her completely white hands. Her heart beat slowly, barely perceptible. She did not breathe. She lay sunken in the depths of an exhaustion, out of which no shout, no invocation, no cry of despair could have dragged her. She was as though dead.
A hand was laid upon Freder's shoulder.
He turned his head. He looked into the face of his father.
Was that his father? Was that Joh Fredersen, master over the great Metropolis? Had his father such white hair? And such a creased brow? And such tortured eyes?
Was there, in this world, after this night of madness, only the horror and death and destruction and agony—all without end?
"What are you after here?" asked Freder, the son of Joh Fredersen. "Do you want to take her away from me? Have you made plans to separate me and her? Is there some mighty undertaking in danger to which she and I are to be sacrificed?"
"With whom are you speaking, Freder?" his father asked, very gently.
Freder did not answer. His eyes opened searchingly, for he had heard a voice never heard before. He was silent.
"If you are speaking of Joh Fredersen," continued the very gentle voice, "then let me tell you that, on this night, Joh Fredersen died a sevenfold death."
Freder's eyes, burnt with anguish, raised to the eyes which were above him. A miserable, sobbing sound came from out his lips.
"Oh my God—Father! Father..."
Joh Fredersen stooped down over him and over the girl who lay in Freder's lap.
"She is dying, father… Can't you see she is dying?"
Joh Fredersen shook his head.
"No, no," said his gentle voice. "No, Freder. In my life, there was an hour in which, like you, I lay on my knees, holding the woman I loved in my arms. But she truly died. I have fully studied the traits of the dying. I know them perfectly and shall never again forget them… The girl is only sleeping. Do not awaken her by force."
And his hand slipped with an unspeakably tender gesture from Freder's shoulder, on to the hair of the sleeping girl.
"Beloved child!" he said. "Beloved child..."
From out of the depth of her dream, the sweetness of a smile answered him, before which Joh Fredersen bowed himself, as before a sign not of this world. Then he left his son and the girl and passed through the cathedral, made delightful and homely by the colourful radiant beams of sunshine.
Freder watched him go until his gaze became blurred. And suddenly, with an abrupt, fierce, groaning fervour, he raised the girl's mouth to his mouth and kissed her, as though he wished to die of it. For, from out the marvel of light, spun into ribbons, the realisation had come and fallen upon him that the night was past, that it was day, that the invulnerable transformation of darkness into light was taking place, greatly and graciously, across the world.
"Come round, Maria, beloved!" he said, imploring her with his caressing and with his affection. "Come to me, beloved! Come to me!"
The soft answer of her heartbeat and of her breathing made a laugh well up from his throat, and the fervour of his whispers died on her lips.
Joh Fredersen heard the sound of his son's laugh, just about. He was already near the door of the cathedral. He stopped and looked around, seeing the cluster of pillars in their delicate niches, shielded by canopies, where the saintly men and women stood, smiling gently.
You have suffered, thought his dream-filled brain. You are redeemed from your suffering. Be blessed in its death… Is it worthwhile to suffer? Yes.
And he went out of the cathedral on feet which were still as though dead; he stepped tentatively through the hefty doorway, standing dazzled in the light and swaying as though drunken. For the wine of suffering which he had drunk was very heavy, intoxicating and white-hot.
His soul spoke within him as he went reeling: I wish to go home and look for my mother.
< Chapter 22 = = = = = = = = = = = Chapter 24 >