Bernard: “I’ve run out of palinka. Would you give me a bottle?”
Ohlsdorfer: “Give him some… Why didn’t you go into town?"
B: "The wind’s blown it away."
O: "How come?"
B: "It’s gone to ruin."
O: "Why would it go to ruin?"
B: "Because everything’s in ruins, everything’s been degraded,
but I could say that they’ve ruined and degraded everything. Because this is
not some kind of cataclysm, coming about with so-called innocent human aid. On
the contrary, it’s about man’s own judgement over his own self, which of course
God has a hand in, or dare I say: takes part in. And whatever he takes part in
is the most ghastly creation that you can imagine. Because you see the world
has been debased. So it doesn’t matter what I say because everything has been
debased that they’ve acquired and since they’ve acquired everything in a
sneaky, underhand fight, they’ve debased everything. Because whatever they
touch – and they touch everything – they’ve debased. This is the way it was
until the final victory. Until the triumphant end. Acquire debase, debase,
acquire. Or I can put it differently if you like: to touch, debase and thereby
acquire, or touch, acquire and thereby debase. It’s been going on like this for
centuries. On, on, and on. This and only this, sometimes on the sly, sometimes
rudely, sometimes gently, sometimes brutally but it has been going on and on.
Yet only in one way, like a rat attacks from ambush. Because for this perfect
victory it was also essential that the other side… That is, everything that’s
excellent, great in some way and noble should not engage in any kind of fight.
There shouldn’t be any kind of struggle, just the sudden disappearance of one
side, meaning the disappearance of the excellent, the great and the noble. So
that by now these winning winners who attack from ambush rule the earth, and
there isn’t a single tiny nook where one can hide something from them. Because
everything they can lay their hands on is theirs. Even things we think they
can’t reach but they do reach are also theirs, because the sky is already
theirs and all our dreams. Theirs is the moment, nature, infinite silence. Even
immortality is theirs, you understand? Everything, everything is lost forever!
And those many noble great and excellent just stood there, if I can put it that
way. They stopped at this point and had to understand and had to accept that
there is neither god nor gods. And the excellent, the great and the noble had
to understand and accept this night from the beginning. But of course they were
quite incapable of understanding it. They believed it and accepted it but they
didn’t understand it. They just stood there, bewildered but not resigned until
something – that spark from the brain – finally enlightened them. And all at
once they realized that there is neither god nor gods. All at once they saw
that there is neither good nor bad. Then they saw and understood that if this
was so, then they themselves do not exist either! You see, I reckon this may
have been the moment when we can say that were extinguished, they burnt out.
Extinguished and burnt out like the fire left to smolder in the meadow. One was
the constant loser one was the constant winner. Defeat victory defeat victory
and one day here in the neighborhood I had to realize, and I did realize, that
I was mistaken, I was truly mistaken when I thought that there has never been
and could never be any kind of change here on earth. Because believe me, I know
now that this change has indeed taken place."
The Turin Horse plays this weekend at the Walker Art Center. Yeah, I work there. So what?
