Konrad and Alexandra (PDF) - Rolf Gross

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Tamunia. You know that I have the highest regards for George’s business acumen."She had never seen her otherwise gentle, sensitive uncle so bitter. Finally, she thought, I discover the deeper reasons forthe smoldering resentments between my two families.David gave her a smile. "Tell me about yourself and Konrad. I hear you fled St. Petersburg with only what you couldcarry. I can imagine that the social and political situation in Russia has, under the pressures of this disastrous war,become dangerously chaotic. Have you found suitable work in Tbilisi?"She was touched and felt encouraged; here was someone who seemed to have an idea of what they had been through.She described their life during the past few years and their march across the mountains. She told him of the excellentjobs they had found. Finally she confessed that the reason for her coming was the hope that he would explain to her theconfusing situation and the future of Georgia. "If one comes from St. Petersburg, Tbilisi appears like a tiny paradisicalisland in a sea of collapsing empires. This illusion cannot last. What then? That is why I asked you about your views onthe land reform, not guessing what abyss was waiting for me."David looked past her and did not answer for a while. She followed his eyes and saw the portraits of her ancestors on theback wall of the room.He lowered his gaze. "Yes, they will destroy the Georgia your ancestors built. The old landowning families will disappearto make room for a new order. Your wedding was the last traditional celebration in this valley, even Konrad looked like aspecter from the last century. He reminded me of ill-fated Griboyedov marrying Tamara Chavchavadze eighty yearsearlier."He smiled. "You did well to marry this man. And even better was your decision to study medicine, when this was barelyconceivable for a woman from an aristocratic Georgian family. You made the jump into a bourgeois life whether youknew it at the time or not. I admire Irakli for giving you that freedom. I would not have had his courage and foresight hadyou been my daughter."He paused and took a sip from his glass. "Dear Alexandra, I am no prophet. I am not even cut out to play Cassandra. ButI fear that for a while our lives are going to get much worse. Maybe a responsible Georgian bourgeoisie will grow up. Yousee, until now, the Armenians were the bourgeois middle class. The Georgians were either princes or peasants. Oursociety was feudal in the best sense until the end of last century. Ilia was one of the first Georgian hommes bourgeoises.And that, not his politics, was the deeper reason why I was so often at loggerheads with him."He crossed himself. "May he rest in peace."David sank into silence for a while and sighed. "I am no friend of the Socialists. They will be the new order. I distrust andoften despise them, not because they want to destroy the old aristocracy, but because they are upstarts who have nounderstanding of our culture."Alexandra sympathized with her uncle, but she felt she was part of the new generation, and she did love Georgia asmuch as he did. "I may not feel the weight of my ancestors on my shoulders as you do. When I married Konrad myconcern was to find a bridge between East and West, to free myself of my Oriental heritage as a woman as much as anindividual—without losing my Georgian traditions. For years I fought to be aware of and be responsible for my ownactions. To learn this took twenty years of ‘exile.’"David looked at her with tired skepticism. She blushed and continued, "When I was young and naïve I hoped to comeback and teach Georgian women how to free themselves from their limitations. Now I see that it is the women who upholdthe old order. The Georgian women are not in the least interested in taking responsibility for their own actions, lestthey disturb their lazy, ignorant men in the sleep they provide for them."Startled, David gave a hollow laugh. "You mean you pursue a program to radicalize Georgian women?"Alexandra became alarmed, but continued. "No, not a program. Attempts at revolutionizing Georgian women I will gladlyleave to Tamara Dadeshkeliani and her Socialist friends. But I feel all they will accomplish is to replace one straightjacketwith another. If you understand me right, one belief system with an other: Instead of God, the Church, and the Emperor,Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky will dispense salvation!"David admitted that he did not understand. "Man has to believe in some higher being, in some system which acts as thefinal arbiter for his ethics. You are right, the Socialists would like to replace our Christian religion with a secular one. I findthis very dangerous, one should never allow any man to determine what is right and wrong."Alexandra became aware that she had overextended herself. She had steered the conversation into an area which shehad not sufficiently explored herself. If only Konrad were here, his presence would give her the courage to continue herargument. David did not seem to understand what she was wanting to say.She decided to try again to formulate her fundamental concern. "I do not want to abolish religion, but I would like to makeevery person responsible for his or her actions with respect to society as well as religion, instead of following longestablishedor new rules and prescriptions blindly. Maybe I do see the church as a human institution like any other, full oferrors and open to being challenged. I certainly agree with you in that I seriously question the ‘moral’ values promoted bypoliticians, philosophers, and charlatans. But I allow myself the same critical right against religious values."David straightened and stared at her distastefully. "Isn’t that Western intellectual humanism?"Alexandra lost her verve. She felt driven into a corner. "If you want to give my conviction a philosophical label you could204
call it intellectual humanism. It does go back to the Renaissance."Very serious, David explained that to him this individualist persuasion had always appeared to be the ultimate danger toany established order. "You are putting an enormous responsibility on man, how can you expect him to bear that weight?Decide what is good and bad on one’s own cognizance? Are you doubting the existence of God as the final source of ourmoral values?"Against her better judgement she confessed. "In a certain sense, yes. For me, God is part of me, not an outside authoritywhich exists independently of myself. The knowledge of good and bad is given to me. I know it is difficult to tap this innerorder, one has to learn to balance one’s mind completely to see it. And even if one learns to do that, one still makesmistakes."David was horrified by her individualism and made the remark which would continue to haunt her for the rest of her life. "Ifear this persuasion will give you much trouble in the years to come. I wish you the strength and the discretion tocontinue to believe in this kind of freedom. Do hide it from your friends and neighbors. They might try to kill you."As she drove home Alexandra recalled their meeting. She was unhappy with herself. She had wanted to get someguidance from David for the future, and the conversation, entirely out of her control, had slipped into this philosophicaldiscussion which she should have had with Konrad or Friedrich, but not with David.How had this happened to her? It was true that her conclusion about the relativity of God and all ethical values had beengrowing in her mind for a long time. The naked bottom of God in the Sistina! Looking for someone on whom to try outthese thoughts, she had got the wrong person.Well, my dear, she told herself, you did get your advice for the future: hide your thoughts from your friends andneighbors, they might try to kill you.65.German troops in Tbilisi1918 – 1919In November, 1918 the Bolsheviks’ coup d’état deposed the Socialist coalition government in Petrograd. Leninproclaimed the Revolution. At a time when the Russians were slaughtering each other, wily Jordania saw his opportunityto declare Georgia an independent Republic.The war had exhausted the resources of Europe. While the German armies were bleeding to death in the trenches ofFrance, their Eastern front extended as far as the Crimean. The complete disintegration of the Russian army forcedLenin to accept a separate armistice with Germany, which Trotsky signed in Brest-Litovsk. He gave away Poti and partsof Georgia and Armenia to Turkey, Germany’s ally.The new Georgian government refused to acknowledge the treaty and produced a bizarre charade by inviting theGermans to occupy Georgia in order to defend the young Republic against Bolsheviks and Turks alike.On June 21, 1918, German troops marched into Tbilisi cheered by flag-waving crowds and the band of the German Clubplaying the Parisian Entry March of 1871.Otto watched from the balcony of his grandparents’ house because his father had sternly forbidden him to go into thestreets. For the first time in his life Otto saw the military representatives of his Fatherland march. Later father and sonhad a serious discussion about the dangers and consequences of Otto’s three allegiances.A few days later Konrad’s strict authority was undermined by an unexpected visitor, Freiherr Friedrich-Werner von derSchulenburg. He appeared at the house in a most cheerful mood with a thick package of letters from their relatives andfriends. Schulenburg had been named German ambassador to the new Georgian Republic.He received a most enthusiastic welcome. Irakli recovered a bottle of his best wine from the cellar, and they spent theevening talking, exchanging news, and discussing their common friends as if peace was at hand.Alexandra cried over the first letters in years from Niko and Claudia, Katharina, Clara Westhoff, and a long, propheticepistle from Joachim von Bredow, which Konrad read aloud. Joachim von Bredow was, as usual, prophesying thecollapse of the world in a few months and once again urged them to leave for Germany as speedily as possible. Thistime there were reasons to take his advice seriously.Schulenburg was so happy to be back in Tbilisi that he could not muster the courage to be honest with his hosts andconfirm Joachim’s black visions. By midnight they were all happily drunk, except for Konrad who had turned very quiet.Alexandra, who had watched Konrad all evening, dreaded what she knew was to come. The following morning she andKonrad went for a long walk in the hills and for the fourth time argued the case for and against leaving for Germany, a205
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Table of Contents1. My Grandfather'
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1.My Grandfather's Watch among the
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ditch beside the road.Mother was tr
Page 9 and 10:
Deep snow still covered Djvari Pass
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"But you know nothing about how to
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newborn baby! You won’t need a ba
Page 15 and 16:
Dadiani bent over the table, reache
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Autumn had come to Georgia, and it
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"Gespenstisch!" whispered Mouravi t
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Finally, depressed by his inability
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They slowly rode up the hill north
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On their way back to the Lavra Alex
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Blushing like a young girl, she gav
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Alexandra bowed deeply to a middle-
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All applauded and Ilia made a small
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She had done her hair up in a new w
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ape her. But then he must die, and
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a rear door when she entered.If Per
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Alexandra went purple with embarras
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The smell of roasting lamb wafted t
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Konrad quietly sat back. To his gre
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The tall, dark-haired woman began w
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She kissed him."Maybe you dream of
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14.Tuscany - the Wolfsons' House in
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ut are, unjustly, much more famous.
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Alexandra had fallen into melanchol
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She kissed him tenderly. "Niko, I a
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obligations, and she, ever since th
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months, was flooded with the diffus
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could they be aroused into communal
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19.An unexpected encounter with Vla
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chauffeur drop me at the station ju
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She described her sensation of flyi
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sky a thin, transparent blue. Imbed
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interest in Theosophy."Marti shrugg
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to?Mother had never mentioned any d
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"Ah, of course, of course, ‘Eine
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Konrad agreed that this sounded mor
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patriarchal oak and smiled, a littl
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have a similar situation in our vil
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Alexandra disagreed. "Most abortive
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a limited edition, hand-screened ma
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Alexandra touched her necklace and
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close!"She had hugged him, tears ru
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The others came lumbering up the st
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urden the heart with this task, whi
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the colors mixed and changed depend
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28.Kandinsky's suprising confession
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With kisses Alexandra removed the v
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He knelt, removed her knee and leg
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Joachim viewed Konrad with sympathe
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The rumbling continued at regular i
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Russia."She picked up a piece of br
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conservative pessimism, demanded th
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preventative method and taking it e
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new provocation in modern music and
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exhausted the Renaissance idea of b
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creative clairvoyance, and her shar
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Left to herself, Alexandra, awed, w
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public. She fended off the fuzzy wo
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ailways on strike. The strike had t
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Grandfather was very sad when he fo
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and put on his coat and shoes, he r
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Alexandra not in the mood to give V
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crowd of the fashionable and the ma
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established tradition with some mil
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42.Uncle Muravi's Benz, Tiflis1907"
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equisitioned a locomotive to take t
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meaningless rituals. That may be on
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lacking. I like this man, and at th
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are suitably ambiguous."45.The Dadi
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think of Munich or something else p
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He showed them the room where they
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death."Alexandra was more intereste
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they fought over the offering. The
Page 153 and 154: flew off cawing.Claudia grabbed Ale
Page 155 and 156: Together they were hedging out a pl
Page 157 and 158: the right of women to own their bod
Page 159 and 160: The Chinese wife of a sinologist at
Page 161 and 162: these texts."However, Ch'an is the
Page 163 and 164: times, but moved back together agai
Page 165 and 166: survived the Bolsheviks, the Fascis
Page 167 and 168: physically overwhelm her. Despite h
Page 169 and 170: Konrad picked up Alexandra at the t
Page 171 and 172: Abruptly her vision had narrowed, a
Page 173 and 174: the Kwadjagani, the Masters of Wisd
Page 175 and 176: somewhat, his back was still bent,
Page 177 and 178: century. The characteristic Chinese
Page 179 and 180: Alexandra was relieved and happy, a
Page 181 and 182: subconscious past her observant min
Page 183 and 184: Dahl leaned back in surprise. "This
Page 185 and 186: visions reappear. Entire armies mar
Page 187 and 188: "This method is not easy, I have ne
Page 189 and 190: He had started with representationa
Page 191 and 192: His hair had turned completely whit
Page 193 and 194: Overnight the mood in St. Petersbur
Page 195 and 196: daughter. His wife had left him no
Page 197 and 198: which was presented to him—with a
Page 199 and 200: "From the soldiers whom I took care
Page 201 and 202: He watched Alexandra’s doubting m
Page 203: lond, bony girl whose gray eyes loo
Page 207 and 208: time I asked this question I had me
Page 209 and 210: "I spent most of the winter of 1918
Page 211 and 212: We buried him in the cemetery at G
Page 213 and 214: ways. Corruption became the way of
Page 215 and 216: 68.A Concert in Kreuth - Eliso1989I
Page 217 and 218: Eliso listened with increasing fasc
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