Death in Venice and Other Stories by Thomas Mann Page B

poked out from his Danish sailor’s cap and say: “Good day, Hans Hansen, with the nice shock of hair! Are you still
primus
? Say hello to Papa and Mama, my fine young man . . .”
    That was Hans Hansen, and ever since they had known each other, the mere sight of him had filled Tonio Kröger with longing, a jealous longing that sat somewhere above the breast and burned. Oh, to have your blue eyes, he thought, to live as peacefully and happily with the entire world as you do! You are always doing something respectable and generally considered worthwhile. After your homework, you take riding lessons or make something with your fretsaw. Even during vacation by the sea, your time is spent rowing, sailing and swimming, while I lie around in the sand, idly daydreaming and staring at the mysterious shifting expressions that flit across the face of the ocean. That’s why
your
eyes are so bright. Oh, to be like you . . .
    He made no attempt to become like Hans Hansen, and perhaps this wish was never meant very seriously. But he felt an anguished desire to be loved by him for what he was, and he vied for such love in his own way, in slow, heartfelt, solicitous, long-suffering melancholy, although it was a melancholy that could burn more brightly and more intensely than any of the impetuous passion one might have expected from his foreign appearance.
    And his overtures were not entirely in vain, for Hans, who incidentally respected Tonio for a certain mastery, a skill with words that allowed him to express complicated things, clearly understood that an extraordinarily strong and tender affection was alive for him. He did his best to show his gratitude and was the cause in Tonio of much delight at reciprocated interest, but also of much jealous dismay and disappointment at his ultimately fruitless efforts to establish a deeper bond between them. For thestrangest thing was that Tonio, who envied Hans Hansen and the life he led, was nonetheless constantly trying to convert him to his own ways, an enterprise that could succeed at best for isolated moments and even then only superficially . . .
    â€œI’ve just been reading something wonderful, something splendid . . .” said Tonio Kröger. They walked along sharing a bag of fruit drops they had bought for ten pfennigs at Iversen’s store on
Mühlenstraße
. “You must read it, Hans. It’s Schiller’s
Don Carlos
 . . . I’ll lend it to you, if you want . . .”
    â€œOh no,” said Hans Hansen. “Forget it, Tonio. That’s not for me. I’ll stick to my horse books. There are some fabulous illustrations in them, I tell you. Sometime when you’re at my house, I’ll show them to you. They have stop-action photographs where you can see the animals at a trot, a gallop or a jump, in all the positions too fast to be made out with the naked eye . . .”
    â€œIn all the positions?” Tonio asked, to be polite. “That’s swell. But
Don Carlos
, now that beats everything. There are parts, you’ll see, that are so beautiful they send a chill up your spine. At the same time they’re like a small explosion . . .”
    â€œAn explosion?” asked Hans Hansen. “How so?”
    â€œWell now, there’s the part where the king breaks down because he’s been betrayed by the marquis . . . although the marquis has only betrayed him out of love, you see, because he’s sacrificing himself for the prince. And then the news makes its way from the royal cabinet into the anteroom that the king is in tears. ‘In tears?’ ‘The king in tears?’ None of the courtiers know what to say, and it’s really moving because the king is such a terribly strict, strong man. You can easily understand why he breaks down and cries, though, and I actually feel sorrier for him than the prince and the marquis put