Despite Müller's genius, he is one of those authors that remain a mystery. His books are not precisely easy to find in the bookshops but I finally got hold of Theatremachine, translated and edited by Marc von Henning. I never managed to learn German -I tried, oh, yes I tried- but it is clear that translating Müller's work must be one of the hardest things ever to translate. A Hundred Steps is fairly easy to read but some of his plays are so obscure that one stumbles on the intricate political content that hides under or inside the images. One can only close eyes-wide-open and meditate upon the flashes of war and despair that he paints in technicholor.
A Hundred Steps
After Defoe
In the century of the plague,
A man lived in Bow, North London
Boatsman, penniless, without renown, but
Faithful to his own. Prudent too
In his loyalty.
From the cities below
Where the plague was
He dragged the food up
To those well off and afraid on their boats
Out in mid-stream.
That's how the plague nourished him
But also to the outhouse
With his wife and the four-year-old
The plague had come.
And every evening he dragged a sack of supplies
Fruit of the day, up from the river to a stone a hundred steps from the
outhouse.
Then retreating he called to the wife. Watching
As she picked up the sack, following every one of her movements
vigilantly
He stood there for a time
At this safe distance
And returned her greeting.
Heiner Müller