HEART OF GLASS
I look into the distance,
to the end of the world.
Before the day is over, the end will come.
First, time will tumble and then the earth.
The clouds will begin to race.
The earth boils over. This is the sign.
This is the beginning of the end.
The world's edge begins to crumble,
everything starts to collapse,
tumbles, falls, crumbles and collapses.
I look into the cataract.
I feel an undertow.
It draws me, it sucks me down.
I begin to fall.
I fall... I am faint from falling.
Now I look at one spot in the tumbling waters.
I seek one spot on which my eyes can rest.
I become light, lighter and lighter.
Everything becomes light, I fly upwards.
Out of the falling and the flying, a new land rises.
Like the submerged Atlantis, the earth rises out of the waters.
I see a new earth.
Come here, don't be afraid.
Come here, I said.
The Giant has... eyes like mill-stones.
Fingers...
...like tree branches.
His nose is a boulder.
The village lives in fear.
Rup says he's seen a Giant.
The time of the Giants is coming back.
The Giant breaks the trees and beats our cattle
and tears out our guts if he sees us.
He's sucking out our brains.
Tell Rup there are no Giants.
Next time he should note the position of the sun.
The sun was low, the Giant was just the shadow of a dwarf.
If nothing changes, you think that's a blessing.
But I see a fire.
And I see the glass factory.
And I'll tell you something else.
Look up at the two bridges.
A liar is about to cross one bridge, a thief the other.
Tomorrow you'll be finished, Ascherl
I'll sleep off my hangover on your corpse.
Innkeeper, bring Wudy another beer.
I'll sleep on your corpse.
Hias said that I'll sleep on your corpse.
Hias sees into the future.
Provided we sleep in the hay.
And I must fall down onto the threshing-place first.
Then you must fall on me.
If you don't fall soft, you'll be dead, too.
Mühlbeck has died
and no one knows the secret of the Ruby glass.
He knew how to write.
He could easily have written it down.
How the Ruby glass is made.
Have you ever written a word?
But Mühlbeck could have talked, Mühlbeck could.
My God!
That was the second glass.
This splendour is now relinquished from the world.
Now what will protect me now from the Evil of the universe?
You wouldn't dare.
I would.
Father, have you seen Adalbert?
Naked in bed again...
Come on, get dressed!
Glass has a fragile soul.
It is unstained.
A crack is the Sin.
After the Sin, there is no sound.
Will the future see the necessary fall of the factories...
...just as we see the ruined fortress as a sign of inevitable change?
People say that Hias has seen to it,
that nettles are springing out of the glass factories.
The lilac bushes...will pine for the company of men, they say.
The Ruby must save us.
Tear Mühlbeck's house down
and look for the secret in every crevice.
Dig three feet into the earth on which his house stood,
for Mühlbeck could have buried his secret.
Bring me the green davenport that he gave to his mother, Anamirl.
The untidiness of the stars makes my head ache.
The master does not want his breakfast now.
Ludmilla may wear her hair down today.
Yes, she may wear her hair down.
A favour for the servant.
Father,
glass-blower Gigl thinks he has the secret of Ruby glass.
This is the day to stand up.
No, I'd sooner stay in my chair.
I feel as though my backbone had crumbled.
Your backbone is not soft.
You won't collapse like a heap of stones.
For twelve years you have been sitting in this chair.
For twelve years!
For twelve years I've shown you your shoes.
For twelve years!
Fine!
I'll have you carried, as usual.
Are you sure? Is this really Ruby glass?
Yes.
Is this really Ruby glass?
That's supposed to be Ruby?
Another one.
Should I leave this place?
Madness is rampant in the village.
The factory owner wants a new furnace,
but there are no builders.
Suddenly, I see a fire flowing in the brook...
...and the wind pushing the fire on.
I see the trees burning like matchsticks.
I see many people running up a hill.
Breathless, they stop at the top
and, paralysed, they turn to stone.
One beside the other.
A whole forest of stone.
Then it becomes dark and still.
Down below, everything has perished.
These is no man, no house.
Only some debris.
Yes, and then I see someone running on the road below
with a burning branch in his hand, crying,
"Am I really the last one, the only one left?"
Send for the herdsman Hias,
that he may see the mystery of the Ruby glass.
Even if we must tear Mühlbeck from his grave
so that Hias can read his brain.
How strange, a whole town made of glass...
...with people living in it.
How can people live in glass houses?
Here's the church.
Animals live in the church, all kinds of animals.
Hares, chickens, deer,
birds, cows,
but there are no people in the church.
The streets are deserted.
Everything is covered in snow.
Let it be. There is more to break today.
Leave the mansion.
The master could slip and end up sitting on your face.
Why the snivelling?
Better that the servant prays for us to find the secret of the Ruby.
So much will happen.
Hias is outside.
Already?
He knew?
He didn't need a messenger?
Master, please send a hunter to slay the bear.
The bulls are frightened
and Sam and I can't promise that he won't kill a bull
or cause a stampede.
On the day of the bear, a bull will run as far as Mainz.
Mühlbeck has died.
He has taken his secret with him.
You are to see the secret of the Ruby.
Mühlbeck has abandoned us.
I don't know the ingredient.
You know it for ten florins.
Then you know it for a thousand.
Do you want our people to eat oatmeal bread again,
that gives them headaches?
Then tell me the secret
so we can make Ruby glass again. You can become foreman.
And I'll carry a millstone to Trier.
I've only come because of the hunter.
I want the Ruby again.
I want the red glass, understand?
I need a glass to contain my blood
or it will trickle away.
The sun is hurting me.
You will never see the sun again.
Rats will bite your ear lobes.
Wudy is dead.
No!
Ascherl's the one who's been nabbed.
Hias predicted that the one underneath falls first.
And look,
the other falls on top of him, he falls softly.
Wudy survived it.
Let's separate them.
The one whose arm falls first is the dead man.
I'll be damned!
Don't curse in the face of the dead.
Now we know.
What Hias foresees, happens.
It's Toni.
You buried our foreman, Mühlbeck, the week before last.
Now they don't know what to do.
Hias predicted it.
You know about the Ruby glass?
The Ruby is the master's malady.
The davenport is here.
Bring it in.
I'm delighted with this letter.
Adalbert, give me the letter-opener.
We'll read this message.
Can he decipher that?
If a letter reaches someone with the words scattered around...
...it should make you think.
Are you going up to the woods again?
I don't need the flour now.
I see that I only get away when the snow lies.
I'll put it back, then.
Your Mühlbecks dead.
They've taken away your davenport.
Yes, he always sat there.
When night falls, the people will die.
By day the rain pours...
...yet the land is drying up.
You have been invited because you describe the Ruby so beautifully.
I can't hear enough of it.
The land of the Ruby.
My land.
And all the people...
...dance in the red glow...
...and live in it.
Their blood, their life.
Everything is in the glass.
In the red, in the colour.
This land is the only one.
Everything is in this land
and everything is Ruby.
Your prayer has worked a miracle.
For an hour, I have known something I never knew.
I can sell my secret to all glassworks.
Break all you can.
I shall have ten racks of Ruby glass taken to the Arber
.and thrown into the lake so it is dyed red.
Adalbert, did you understand?
The lake is dyed red.
The glass for the lake must go this very day.
Take everything from the store.
And another thing.
Restuff the davenport and mend it
and take it to Anamirl with ten florins as compensation
Tell her I no longer wish her dead Mühlbeck to go to the devil.
May he be surrounded by a host of angels.
I have it.
It is here.
Here.
And inside here.
We all...
I've already sent for the Pléssberg furnace builders.
The mistress will be surprised when she returns.
She'll see nothing left standing.
Lunatic.
When she dismounts, she'll fall into the mud.
And you'll be on a big boat, puking.
Anything else?
Will there be any free beer today?
The master's out of order.
And in the glassworks there's been Beelzebub.
He sent out ten men with racks of glass,
but they weren't so stupid as to throw valuable glass in the lake.
They'll smuggle it over the border and sell it.
Ludmilla, go before he wants something from you.
Ludmilla, make yourself beautiful.
The master wants your company.
I must provide some music.
In the meadow there'll be someone who can play the hurdy-gurdy.
But I'd have to sing with it.
Harp-Tom is in the inn.
Tell him to come, it will be to his advantage.
Now you've a soft seat again.
The night is coming on slowly today.
It creeps into the village
and in the stables people softly cuddle with the animals.
In the factory they're working again, against fear,
but they know their work is in vain.
I told them, the factory will burn down in the night.
But, like sleep-walkers, people walk towards their doom.
And then?
Then the little one starts a war
and the big one across the ocean extinguishes it.
Then you won't get a loaf for two hundred florins.
Then a strict master comes,
who takes people's shirts and their skin with them.
After the War you think there'll be Peace,
but there won't be.
Drink up.
I miss Ascherl
You shouldn't have smothered him.
I miss Ascherl
He should have been here today.
Can't you go out to him? He can't come inside.
Bring me some Ascherl
Even if I believe all you say, I don't believe that.
Believe it or not, that's your affair.
I tell what I see. I don't know if it will happen.
And then?
The peasants will dress like townspeople
and the townspeople will be like apes.
Women will wear trousers and boots.
The peasants will stand in their dung heaps with polished boots.
The peasants will eat cake and discuss politics.
Who'll play for us?
I'll play for these two.
Keep playing!
They all fight.
There is War in every house.
No man will like another man.
The elegant and fine people will be murdered.
He who has smooth hands will be slain.
The peasants will encircle their houses with a high fence
and shoot at the townspeople from their windows.
The townspeople will beg, "Let me plough the ground",
but they will be slain.
No man will like another man.
If two people are on one bench
and one asks the other to move over
and the other doesn't, it'll be his death.
That will be the time of the Clearing of the Benches.
She is cooling off,
then she won't crack any more.
That's the pure ingredient.
What are factories still good for?
Paulin must dance
naked on the table!
You won't be able to tell between summer and winter.
Everyone will have a different head
and the forest will get sparse, like the beggar's gown.
The Small will be tall again.
When the Redcoats come with their red coats,
then you must run fast
and take a loaf of bread with you.
Whoever has three loaves and drops one on the way
must not stoop.
Even if you lose the second one, you must leave it behind.
You can subsist with one loaf
because it doesn't last long.
The few who survive must have an iron head.
People become ill, but no one can help them.
Those who survive, will stick together
and call each other Brother and Sister.
Take everything off, so we see something!
The factory is on fire!
If it's burning, I'd like to be there.
Where are my shoes?
For twelve years there's been no fire.
Twelve years!
And my shoes are gone.
People settle down as though never wanting to leave this world.
But overnight the Clearing of the World begins.
From the orient a huge bird appears
and shits into the sea.
The sea rises as high as a house and boils.
The earth trembles and a big island half drowns.
The big city with the iron tower is in flames,
but the fire was started by its own men and the city is levelled.
In Italy the clergy is killed and the churches collapse.
The Pope sits in a cell.
During his flight he consecrates a goat as bishop.
People starve.
The three days of darkness draw nearer.
Where the black box drops,
a green and yellow dust arises.
The weather will change.
Vineyards will be grown here
and there is fruit I don't know.
Ludmilla!
Ludmilla lies dead in the master's office
and Toni plays her one song after another on his harp.
Hias has wished this calamity on us.
I merely predicted it.
He has Devil's eyes, he has the Evil Eye. Lock him up!
I do not see any more.
It is so dark.
I must see something again.
I must go to the woods.
I have to go to the woods.
I want to see the woods again.
Don't you want to see any people?
I like you.
You have a heart of glass.
And now I'm going to roast the bear.
In the night someone looks across the forest and sees not a single light.
And when he sees a juniper bush in the twilight,
he runs to see if it isn't a human being.
There are so few left.
In the forest, roosters crow, but the people have perished.
Something else occurs to me.
I see it again.
A coachman stops and gets down from his coach.
He knocks down on the ground with his whip and says,
"There was once the big town of Straubing."
Now I see the rocky island again.
I see it quite clearly.
A rocky island far out in the sea
and a second, smaller island.
They lie on the far edge of the inhabited world.
On one island, for centuries, some forgotten men have lived.
And because they live on the far edge of the inhabited world,
word has not reached them that the earth is round.
They have retained the belief that the earth is flat
and that the ocean far beyond ends in a yawning abyss.
I see a man on top of the rock.
For years he stood alone, looking out over the sea,
day after day, always in the same place.
He is the first one to doubt.
Then, years later, three other men join him.
For many years they gaze across the sea from the rock.
Then, one day, they decide to risk the ultimate.
They want to reach the edge of the world, to see if there is really an abyss.
Musicians accompany their departure.
Then the men set out,
pathetic and senseless.
In a boat that is far too small.
It may have seemed like a sign of hope
that the birds followed them out into the vastness of the sea.