Mother Eve
In the holidays I went once to the house in which, years before, Max Demian and his mother had lived. An old lady was walking in the garden. I entered into conversation and learned that the house belonged to her. I enquired after the Demians. She remembered them very well. But she did not know where they were living at that moment. As she felt my interest, she took me into the house, searched through a leather album and showed me a photograph of Demian’s mother. I scarcely had any recollections of what she was like. But when I saw the little picture my heart stood still. It was my dream picture! There it was, the tall, almost masculine woman’s figure, resembling her son, with traits of motherliness, traits which denoted severity, and deep passion, beautiful and alluring, beautiful and unapproachable, demon and mother, destiny and mistress. That was she!
I was filled with a wild wonder, when I learned that my dream picture lived on earth! There was a woman, then, who looked like that, who bore my fate in her features! Where was she? Where? And she was Demian’s mother!