Schönbrunn

At the end of May, I saw Schönbrunn Palace, including the room where Napoleon slept and Emperor Franz Joseph lived, the neatly trimmed park and the large greenhouse where old palm trees stood in huge tubs among shards of glass, as if wrapped in felt. I was drawn home to this big sad city, full of ruins and sun, hungry girls and disguised Nazis. I had already visited Strauss’s grave and Beethoven’s last apartment, stood by the immovable ferris wheel in Prater, and walked around the fortress-like building in Floridsdorf where the Schutzbund men had bravely fought back during their tragic uprising. We had to fill our days wandering the half-empty streets, reading emigrant books, or going to daytime performances organized by hungry artists in the accidentally surviving theaters or on stages in parks.

I came to Schönbrunn by accident. A journalist friend of mine had looked down at me with contempt and said that I would have to be an uncultured barbarian to not take an interest in such a remarkable monument of the historical past, especially since I had a car and so much free time. I promised him I would visit Schönbrunn so as not to be an uncultured barbarian.

However, neither Napoleon’s son’s tomb nor the wooden gray rotunda in the neatly trimmed park made much of an impression on me. I listened attentively to the explanations of a volunteer guide, and thought about the two young Japanese acrobats I had seen a few...