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735.The farm, which consisted of a hut, a stable, and a barn, surrounded by a green crop with high grass and many fruit tress, lay strangely still and asleep; there were no voices, no footfalls, no children screaming, no scythes being sharpened, not a sound. In the courtyard, a cow stood in the grass, lowing furiously.
Hermann Hesse, Narcissus and Goldmund, translated by Ursele Molinaro, Bantam, 1971, p. 196.
PLACE: Germany
TIME: the Middle Ages
CIRCUMSTANCE: a Plague-ridden farmhouse
He walked through the unguarded gates, and at the echo of his steps many towns and gates rose up in his memory. He remembered how he had walked through them, how he had been received by screaming children, playing boys, quarreling women, the hammering of a forge, the crystal sound of the anvil, the rattling of carts and many other sounds, delicate and coarse, all braided together as though in a web that bore witness to many forms of human labour, joy, bustle, and communication. Here, under this yellow gate, in this empty street, nothing echoed, no one laughed, no one cried, everything lay frozen in deathly silence, cut by the overloud, almost noisy chatter of a running well.
Hermann Hesse, Narcissus and Goldmund, translated by Ursele Molinaro, Bantam, 1971, p. 203-204.
PLACE: Germany
TIME: the Middle Ages
CIRCUMSTANCE: Goldmund enters a Plague-ridden town
Everything was still in its place; the portals, the beautiful fountains, the clumsy old tower of the cathedral and the slender new one of the church of St. Mary, the clear bells of the church of St. Lawrence... Cool, light-green and light-blue, the river streamed under the resounding vaults of the bridge.
Hermann Hesse, Narcissus and Goldmund, translated by Ursele Molinaro, Bantam, 1971, p. 228-229.
PLACE: Germany
TIME: the Middle Ages
CIRCUMSTANCE: Goldmund re-enters the city of Master Niklaus
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