Nothing But the Night

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Nothing But the Night is the literary debut of the American author John Williams from 1948. The story, which takes place in a single day, is a psychological study of the fear and distress of a man who had a traumatic experience in his childhood . that would determine his whole later life. The German translation by Bernhard Robben was published in 2017 under the title Nothing but the Night .

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The story tells a day in Arthur Maxley's life. Maxley lives in an apartment in San Francisco, apparently neither working nor studying, but has enough money for alcohol, pubs and taxis.

The narrative begins with the protagonist's nightmare , from which he wakes up dazed when he is woken up by the phone. He is alone in his dingy apartment, which disgusts him. He's doing badly, the day before he probably drank and smoked too much. Maxley has apparently been through therapy that recommended long walks to get the things that bother him out of his head. He is leaving the house. It is a warm summer day. But instead of going to the park, he goes into a café and orders a drink. The gloomy atmosphere of the café, the waitress, the clatter of dishes, the sunlight seeping through the cloudy windows, everything gets on his nerves. He stumbles out, sits on a bench, and promises to go to the park tomorrow. Words from his nightly dream are constantly circling in his head: "Our father, who you are in heaven", "Our father ...", he cannot get rid of them.

He returns to the apartment house, enters the now clean and tidy apartment and receives a letter from his cleaning lady that a messenger has delivered. When he takes a closer look at the letter, he gets into an uproar, his heart starts beating like mad. The letter is from his father, whom he has not heard from for at least three years. Hollis Maxley apologizes in the letter for writing so seldom because of his global business. A letter must have been lost because he never received a reply, and he asks if Arthur regularly gets his checks. Since he will be in the USA for two months, including today in San Francisco, he proposes a meeting at the Hotel Regency. Fleeting memories arise in Arthur, shadowy memories of a family catastrophe, of his mother and of his father's last call in Boston, when triggered by this "familiar, hated" voice on the phone, suddenly a brutal image of that brutal scene ( a violent image of that violent scene ) like "a wild animal in a jungle" jumped on without warning. (P. 27) He had called for his mother and collapsed screaming. He was eventually found panting and curled up on the floor. The father was called, Arthur was taken to a clinic. His memories of that time are hazy and sketchy. At that time, the father received an urgent recommendation to avoid any contact with the son in the future.

While he is lying on the bed, indulging in his memories, he suddenly sees the image of his father in focus. A strange feeling of warmth towards his father arises in him. He picks up the phone to make an appointment for the evening and, to his own surprise, is disappointed to hear that his father has gone out. Nevertheless, he leaves him a message. He drinks a glass of whiskey, lies down on the bed, waits for the expected effect of the alcohol and begins to dawn. A picture of his mother comes to mind, one that he has desperately avoided thinking about for the past few months. The father's letter seems to have broken a dam here. From his chest of drawers he digs up the portrait of his mother wrapped in a silk scarf. Her "ghostly" eyes stare at him out of wrinkled paper. His gaze wanders over it, into the “blue haze of a lost time” (= the blue haze of a lost time , p. 59). A flood of memories of the golden age of his childhood rises from his subconscious as each day ends with the eagerly awaited goodnight kiss from his mother. He suddenly remembers that he had an appointment with Stafford Long in a bar. Stafford is late as usual. When he finally appears and with his shrill voice and his exalted appearance causes quite a stir in the bar, Arthur has already had one or two cocktails in advance. Stafford tries to pump $ 500 into Arthur for one of his windy projects. When Stafford asks him to get the money from his rich father, he freaks completely and is rudely put in front of the door by the waiter.

Hours later he meets with his father in the dining room of the Regency, who is apparently just as electrified as his son, but does his best not to lose control of himself. While they study the menu in silence, Arthur secretly observes his father and wonders whether he is haunted by terrible memories as he is. For a moment he even pities him, feels sympathy for him. The father begins to talk about the unrest that haunts him, the restless life he leads, business on every continent which, he admits, could easily be delegated to others. He's sick of this kind of life. At this moment Arthur thinks he has an apparition: a woman - she looks like his mother - approaches the table and speaks to Hollis Maxwell. She reproaches him very kindly as to why he did not call her and let her know where he is. Hollis is embarrassed, blushed and, to her apparent surprise, introduces Arthur as his son. Arthur reacts in shock, all his father's pleading to be with him again as before, to redeem himself and himself from their loneliness, come to nothing. Arthur feels that he will never see his father again and runs from the room with tears in his eyes.

Dazed he stands still on the street, noises, lights, the unrest of the big city storm on him. He enters a bar. It's a dance room with an orchestra. He orders brandy, forgets everything, himself, why he is sitting here, how he came here. At some point he notices that a young woman is sitting next to him. She watches him, her eyes a little glassy, ​​her tongue a little heavy. Her name is Claire. He orders champagne, then large glasses of brandy. They dance and he realizes he's getting drunk. They chat a little, he caresses their hands and thinks out loud, “How alone we are. […] Alone, as always. ”The room darkens, a famous dancer is expected to appear and a sudden fear flashes through him. The wild dance begins right in front of his table, the music increases dramatically, it seizes him like a frenzy. His mother's face appears before him, but this time quite strange, dark, hot and wild. And suddenly the memory returns as if bathed in white moonlight: The child woke up from a loud argument between his parents and padded down the stairs. Every little detail of this night scene is clear to him. He hears their voices clearly, understands every syllable, but doesn't understand the meaning of their words. He pushes open the ajar door of the music room and sees, as if in slow motion, his father with his back to the wall, arms up, panic on his face, whimpering noises come from his lips and in front of him the mother who is aiming the gun at him Has. He doesn't know his mother again, madness and ecstasy blaze in her eyes. At that moment she pulls the trigger, the father collapses. Then she puts the barrel of the rifle in her mouth and pulls the trigger again. When Arthur opens his eyes again, he feels his father's arms wrapped around him, his hands are bloody, the whole room is a lake of blood. He screams, frees himself from his father's grip, runs out of the room and passes out.

When Claire gently touches him at the bar with her hand, he gradually wakes up from his trance. Claire is shocked by his condition and says he looks like he saw a ghost. They leave the bar. Claire invites Arthur to her apartment. You get into a taxi, which "shoots off like a projectile that has exploded in the dark barrel of a rifle" (p. 111). Disgust for himself and everything that touches him overwhelms him. He looks at Claire who has snuggled up against him and is aware of the absolute isolation and loneliness of each individual. He follows her into the apartment, which is suddenly illuminated by the silvery moonlight that caresses her graceful figure. He sobs, he can't breathe. He takes her in his arms, hugs her and chokes her. While still conscious, she falls to the ground, a thin thread of blood trickles out of her mouth. She calls him by name. At this moment, 24 years of his life, suppressed love, hate, pity, horror, boredom, fear, flow like a torrent through his head. He rushes at her, hits and hits her. The light goes on, a neighbor enters. As Claire wishes, he takes Arthur by the arm and leads him down to the street. He beats him in the street, fists hit his face, and he lies half dead on the pavement. After a while he gets up, staggers across the street into the darkness "where there was no light, where the night weighed on him, where there was nothing, where nobody was waiting for him, where he was - finally - alone." (P. 123.)

background

Williams, who tried his hand at several jobs and took courses at a university after graduating from high school , volunteered for the United States Army Air Forces at the age of 20 and served as a sergeant in India and Burma. He has not written anything about his war experiences and, according to testimony from friends and his wife, has hardly spoken about anything. During this time he wrote his first book, Nothing But the Night , which he offered to several publishers without success. Finally, the publisher, poet and university professor Allan Swallow accepted (1915-1966) the book, even though he "bleak" (it's pretty dreary ) found and published it in 1948 in his demanding Presseverlag . Swallow had u in its publishing program. a. Works by Janet Lewis (1899–1998), Anaïs Nin , Allen Tate , Frank Waters (1902–1995) and Yvor Winters . As Swallow feared, the book met with a public and financial failure and was soon forgotten. However, Swallow recommended his author to continue his university studies, and Williams enrolled at the University of Denver after the war . He studied English literature, graduated in 1949 and graduated in 1950 with a Master of Arts .

His second book, the novel Butcher's Crossing, was not published until 12 years later . John Williams later practically denied his first work.

criticism

The Italian translator of Nothing But the Night , Stefano Tummolini, writes about the book that Williams' literary debut shows the literary talent of one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century.

expenditure

  • Nothing But the Night . 1948. Denver: Swallow 1948. [first edition]
  • Nothing But the Night . Fayetteville, London: University of Arkansas Press 1990. (The University of Arkansas Reprint Series.) ISBN 1-55728-113-0
  • Nothing but the night . With an afterword by Simon Strauss . German by Bernhard Robben . Munich: dtv 2017. ISBN 978-3-423-28129-4

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ P. 19. All literal quotations from the book translated from: John Williams: Nothing But the Night. Fayetteville 1990.
  2. ↑ Alan Prendergast: Sixteen years after his death, not-so-famous novelist John Williams is finding his audience Westword, November 3, 2010, accessed December 26, 2016
  3. ↑ Daniel Mendelsohn: Hail Augustus! But Who Was He? The New York Review of Books, August 14, 2014, accessed December 26, 2016
  4. ↑ Stefano Tummolini: Nulla, solo la notte, accessed on December 26, 2016