Josephine the Songstress
by Franz Kafka
An Excerpt from Essential Kafka – translated by Phillip Lundberg
Josephine is the name of our songstress. Those who have never heard her sing simply haven't experienced the power of song. Everyone who hears her is pulled out of him or herself, transported, and this is yet more of a mystery since our race as a whole has no great love for music. Peace and quiet {Stiller Frieden} are what we yearn for more than anything-our lives are hard-such is the music that, generally, we love above all others, we just don't have it in us after another long day of work in which we strive to do our best in dispensing with a thousand and one cares, there's just nothing left over with which we might pull ourselves to the distant heights, so far removed, where music comes alive. But we don't generally shed any tears over this, not once do we go so far as to lament our loss, it's just-at least this is my personal opinion on the subject-it's just a minor irrelevancy. There's a certain sort of sly cleverness that kicks in here, one, indeed, that we need terribly: we consider this as being our greatest asset and we use it to laugh off any and all criticism and to console ourselves about everything. Such is our way, such clever-ness in all things practical; indeed, it kicks in even should there be some yearning-though there isn't-but if there were to be such a yearning for the sublime happiness {Glück} that music may, perhaps, deliver. Only Josephine makes an exception, she loves music and knows how to deliver its power, and she's the only one, when she's gone then music too will disappear, and who knows for how long, right out of the midst of our lives. I've thought about this quite often, essentially what is it about music, how does it come alive and touch us so deeply. After all, we're not particularly inclined toward music, indeed, we tend to be rather adverse, so how can it be that we have any understanding of Josephine's performances?... or, since she contends that we don't understand, why is it that we believe that we do? The simplest answer is quite simply that the beauty of her singing is so powerful that even the greatest antagonism is outdone, such sensibilities crumble in her presence-but this answer is hardly satisfactory, not at all. For if it really were to be true then one would always have to have a feeling for the other-worldliness, that some-thing was sounding forth from out of her throat that we have never heard before, something that we don't, truth to tell, even have a capacity for hearing, that we become capable of hearing it only when Josephine sings, she and she alone, nobody else delivers. But from my vantage I'd have to say that this just isn't so, at least I haven't had such an experience and I haven't been able to observe anyone else experiencing something like this either.
Josephine is the name of our songstress. Those who have never heard her sing simply haven't experienced the power of song. Everyone who hears her is pulled out of him or herself, transported, and this is yet more of a mystery since our race as a whole has no great love for music. Peace and quiet {Stiller Frieden} are what we yearn for more than anything-our lives are hard-such is the music that, generally, we love above all others, we just don't have it in us after another long day of work in which we strive to do our best in dispensing with a thousand and one cares, there's just nothing left over with which we might pull ourselves to the distant heights, so far removed, where music comes alive. But we don't generally shed any tears over this, not once do we go so far as to lament our loss, it's just-at least this is my personal opinion on the subject-it's just a minor irrelevancy. There's a certain sort of sly cleverness that kicks in here, one, indeed, that we need terribly: we consider this as being our greatest asset and we use it to laugh off any and all criticism and to console ourselves about everything. Such is our way, such clever-ness in all things practical; indeed, it kicks in even should there be some yearning-though there isn't-but if there were to be such a yearning for the sublime happiness {Glück} that music may, perhaps, deliver. Only Josephine makes an exception, she loves music and knows how to deliver its power, and she's the only one, when she's gone then music too will disappear, and who knows for how long, right out of the midst of our lives. I've thought about this quite often, essentially what is it about music, how does it come alive and touch us so deeply. After all, we're not particularly inclined toward music, indeed, we tend to be rather adverse, so how can it be that we have any understanding of Josephine's performances?... or, since she contends that we don't understand, why is it that we believe that we do? The simplest answer is quite simply that the beauty of her singing is so powerful that even the greatest antagonism is outdone, such sensibilities crumble in her presence-but this answer is hardly satisfactory, not at all. For if it really were to be true then one would always have to have a feeling for the other-worldliness, that some-thing was sounding forth from out of her throat that we have never heard before, something that we don't, truth to tell, even have a capacity for hearing, that we become capable of hearing it only when Josephine sings, she and she alone, nobody else delivers. But from my vantage I'd have to say that this just isn't so, at least I haven't had such an experience and I haven't been able to observe anyone else experiencing something like this either.
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