Milena Jesenska

Questionnaire on Friendship, by Max Frisch Do you think you are a good friend? What feels more like betrayal to you: If the other is doing it? If you do it? How many friends do you have right now? Do you think that the time a friendship lasts is a measure for its value? What would you not forgive a friend? Double tongue? That he is stealing a woman? That he can be sure of you? Irony against you? That he cannot handle criticism? That he values people you see as enemies? That you don't have influence on him? Would you like to be able to contently be without friends? Did you get yourself a dog as friend? Was there ever a time in your life when you had no friends, or do you lower your standards in such times? Do you know friendship with women: Before sex? After sex? Without sex? What do you fear more: being judged by a friend or by an enemy? Why? Do you have enemies that you secretly wish were your friend...

Friday, 5th December From today on I start my new work habit. I have to every day for several hours. In the morning started “Bishop”. Anxious. It shall succeed. Didn’t work enough. Scared that they hinder me. Gymnastics at noon. Liesel, Lotte (breastfeeding), Ria (baking) + bad night, ugly … Wednesday (afternoon), 10th December Still tired. Confused. Worked little. Scared of the success. Am I eager and pure enough that it can succeed? Preparations for Rudi’s birthday. His eyes have to lighten up. Helen says that she feels better since she does not eat animals. Too tired to go to the S.A.G., feel bad conscience. Why can’t I fit into any society? … Tuesday, 16th December Today everything had a bitter taste. Whether the Bishop will work out, whether the job works out, whether all radiance disappears, whether the future breaks, that I am weak, wretched, small, unfit for goodness, life and writing. Help!

Sunday, 16th November 1924 Travel preparation like yesterday. Thereby thinking about a story: the repentance of the Bishop of Priepournous. “The holy Bishop of Priepournous, tralilatralilalala. He healed many women for 20 Sous tralilatralilalala.” Reading “Education to Christianity” with lots of comfort. Spasm in the forehead. Fear that my talent will abandon me, -but only rarely. Rodi and Rodi again. Is it right that I am at home? … Saturday, 29th November I cannot bear it if I don't get to work, I have to write, I desperately feel the wish and will. Visited Lotte Mar., Ria, Fr. Schwarz The fear and remorse, the fear of non-strictness, of the fading tension between Me and the Others is again not [?] there. Bishop continued.

(Narodni Listy, June 6th 1924) Dr Franz Kafka, a German writer who lived in Prague, died the day before yesterday in a sanatorium close by Klosterneuburg/Vienna. Only few people know him here, because he was a solitary, a knowing man, frightened by life; for years he had been suffering from a lung disease and though he had gotten medical treatment for this disease he consciously nourished and promoted it with his thoughts. “When soul and heart cannot bear the burden, then the lungs take half of the burden on themselves so that the weight is equally distributed” he once wrote in a letter, and that was what his disease was like to him. It gave him an almost magical tenderness and a surprisingly merciless mental subtlety; as a human being he had been putting all his intellectual fear of live on the shoulders of this disease. He was timid, scared, tender and good, but wrote brutal and hurtful books. To him the world was full of demons, that destroy and break an unprotected person. He w...

(Nadroni Listy, March 6th, 1927) On a train ride to the mountains we can find ourselves quite suddenly in a bend from where we have a wonderful view. From this spot we can look at the mountain and see clearly and vividly the magnificent picture in its entirety, the mighty contours and the colossal stillness. We freeze with respect, love and admiration, and if we were to turn around and go home we would forever keep this memory of the magnificence of a mountain. However, the train is panting on and suddenly stops close to the bottom of the mountain. We look at the top, turn our necks, and the more we look, the less we see of the mountain. It is colossal, but we cannot see it in its entirety, we cannot see how its top is set against the sky, cannot see its shape, and we only see the few things we can see from close by. With people it is exactly the same. We immediately comprehend a person when we see him for the first time. We see the light in his eyes and get a glimpse of his inn...

Prague born 10 August 1896 1907: starts attending the first gymnasium for girls, Minerva 1913: mother dies after a long sickness 1915: finishing the Gymnasium and starting to study medicine, after 2 semesters she switches to Music 1916: socializing with artists (Ernst Pollak, Max Brod, Ernst Haas, Franz Kafka, etc) in Cafe Arco and starting a romantic relationship with Ernst Pollak 1917: Milena’s father is committing her to a social institute, most likely to separate her from Pollak 1918: marriage with Ernst Pollak, moving to Vienna Vienna 1919-1925: writing articles for “Tribuna” and Nadroni Listi, translating some of Kafka's books 1920 - 1921: intense exchange of letters with Kafka 1923/1924: separation and divorce from Pollak 1924/1925: relationship with Franz Xaver Schaffgotsch, living with friends in Dresden before moving back to Prague Prague 1925-1929: editor for Nadroni Listi 1926: taking on the magazine Pestry tyden ...

Letters to Willi Schlamm, 1938 You accused me several times for being less nice to you. From more than one of your words I take that you believe I am less nice because I am "disappointed". Shall I be "awfully open " again? You assume that I love you, that I was trying to win your love, and when I realized that you don't love me, I became "less nice". One of those assumptions is true: I really do love you very much. I don't completely understand it myself - I only know that I love you very much- but the premise of this love was the fact that you don't love me. And this you don't know. If I had thought it possible that you would love me as well, I would have run away to the far end of the earth.  Whether you can make sense of this does not matter - but it is true: I only needed your friendship. Anything more would have been less. This was the only way I could easefully come to you, feel infinitely happy around you. It was this, your frien...