Walpurgisnacht

Comic and fantastic, gruesome and grotesque, Walpurgisnacht uses Prague as the setting for a clash between German officialdom immured in the ancient castle above the Moldau, and a Czech revolution seething in the city below. History, myth and political reality merge in an apocalyptic climax as the rebels, urged on by a drum covered in human skin, storm the castle to crown a poor violinist 'Emperor of the World' in St Vitus' Cathedral.Written in 1917 Walpurgisnacht continues the message of The Green Face of a decadent society on the brink of collapse and of a Europe past salvation. In it we see Meyrink's exceptional narrative powers at their height."It is 1917. Europe is torn apart by war, Russia in the grip of revolution, the Austro-Hungarian Empire on the brink of collapse. It is Walpurgisnacht, springtime pagan festival of unbridled desire. In this volcanic atmosphere, in a Prague of splendour and decay, the rabble prepare to storm the hilltop castle, and Dr Thaddaeus Halberd, once the court physician, mourns his lost youth. Phantasmagorical prose, energetically translated, marvellously evokes past and present, personal and political, a devastated world."The Times

The marriage ceremony was over. Jubilation echoed round the cathedral, drowning a faint whimpering. Polyxena did not dare turn round to see; she knew what was happening. "The crown!” The voice rang out again. "The crown! The crown!” the cry was taken up from pew to pew. "It's hidden at Countess Zahradka's,” someone shouted. They all thronged to the door, a wild surge. "To Countess Zahradka's! Countess Zahradka's! The crown! Fetch the royal crown!” "It's made of gold, with a ruby at the front!” came a screech from the gallery: Bozena, who always knew everything. "Ruby at the front,” ran the description from mouth to mouth, and they were all as certain as if they had seen the crown with their own eyes. A man climbed onto a plinth. Polyxena recognised the lackey with the vacant stare. He threw his arms about and screamed in such a rapacious frenzy that his voice cracked, "The crown is in Wallenstein Palace!” No one was in doubt any more. "The crown is in Wallenstein Palace!” Behind the howling mob marched the grim, silent figures of the 'Brothers of Mount Horeb', with Polyxena and Ottokar on their shoulders again, as on the way to the Cathedral. Ottokar was wearing the purple robe of Duke Borivoj and carrying his ivory sceptre. The drum was silent. Polyxena's gorge rose in a surge of hatred for this screaming rabble that could be roused to a frenzy of rape and plunder in a few seconds. 'Lower than wild beasts they are, and more cowardly than the worst cringing cur;' and with a deeply cruel sense of satisfaction, she imagined the end of it all, the inevitable end: the rattle of machine-gun fire and the mountain of corpses. She glanced at Ottokar and gave a sigh of relief. 'He sees and hears nothing. It is like a dream to him. God grant him a quick death, before he wakes.' She was completely indifferent to her own fate. The gate of the Wallenstein Palace was firmly blockaded. The mob attempted to climb the walls, and fell back down with bloody hands: the top was all covered with broken glass and iron spikes. One of the men brought a huge beam. Hands grasped it. Back and forward. Back and forward: the monster charged the obstacle again and again, splintering the oak doors with a dull thud until they were wrenched from the iron hinges and disintegrated.