Kaputt by Curzio Malaparte

Author:Curzio Malaparte [Malaparte, Curzio]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Published: 2011-01-06T16:00:00+00:00

The interpreter was a Sonderführer,{12} short and thin, not more than thirty years old, his face covered with little red pimples. He had been born in Russia in the Deutschvolk colony of Melitopol and spoke Russian with an odd German accent. The first time I met him, I said jokingly that Melitopol means the city of honey. "Yes," he replied in a harsh voice and with a sullen look, "there is a lot of honey in that district, but I am not concerned with bees; I am a schoolmaster." The Sonderführer translated the brief and good-natured speech of the "Fettwebel" word for word, and he added in a tone of a schoolmaster upbraiding his pupils, that they had to be careful with the pronunciation, and read with attention and ease, because if they failed to pass the examination, they would have reasons to regret it. Later when I recalled his words, I felt a shiver creeping down my spine.

The prisoners listened in silence, and when the Sonderführer stopped they all began talking among themselves and laughing. Many of them seemed to feel humiliated. They gazed around like whipped dogs and glanced from time to time at their horny peasant hands, but many others laughed contentedly; they felt certain of passing, and of being sent into some office as clerks. "Eh, Pyotr! Eh, Ivanushka!" they shouted to their companions, and slapped each other roughly on the backs with the simple-minded gaiety of the Russian peasant. The workmen among them were silent, turning their stern faces toward the administration building of the kolkhoz, where the German headquarters were. From time to time they looked at the Feldwebel, but they never deigned to glance at the Sonderführer. Their eyes were deep and glazed.

"Ruhe!—Silence!" suddenly shouted the Feldwebel.

A group of officers was already approaching, led by an old colonel, tall and thin, a little stooped, with gray mustaches clipped short; he walked slightly dragging one of his legs. The colonel glanced absent-mindedly at the prisoners and began speaking rapidly in a monotonous voice, swallowing half of his words, as if he were in a hurry to finish his sentences. At the end of each sentence, he made a long pause, but his eyes remained fixed on the ground. He said that those who would pass the examination and so on, and so on—The Sonderführer translated the colonel's brief speech word for word. Then, on his own account he added that the Moscow government had spent millions on Soviet schools, that he knew this because he had been a schoolmaster among the Deutschvolk of Melitopol before the war, and that all those who failed in the examination were to be set to work as laborers and dockworkers; it was their fault if they had learned nothing in school. The Sonderführer seemed very anxious that all of them should read fluently and with a good pronunciation.

"How many are there?" the colonel asked the Feldwebel as he scratched his chin with a gloved hand.

"One hundred and eighteen," replied the Feldwebel.

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