Page - 217 - in Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte, Volume LIX

“i then asked myself: what ist the ‘wiener schule’” 217 an easy subject for his final paper, but he bun- gled the easiest one. His family paid no regard to his father’s will and let him have his inherit- ance. He used a great part of it in founding a literary magazine so exclusive that it never prom- ised financial success. The “Brenner” published Tyrolean poets only; its greatest merit is to have printed Trackl’s poems.42 Ficker’s presence in the Institute had an ambivalent influence on us; he was good looking, tall, speaking in a low voice, somewhat down his nose for shyness or contempt for our scholarly ambitions. We felt him as a challenge to show him our mettle – but often also as a warning signal how childish our aims are: There is nothing creative in what we do, nothing touching the stars as is a well built quatrain. He became a healthy antidote to the arrogance which students of such a sophisti- cated subject as art history often parade. As a literary man, L. Ficker was interested in Eisler’s character. Any time he could watch Eisler show some abhorrent trait Ficker was happy. In order to study this devil better Ficker even travelled with him. He told us with jubilant enthusiasm about a happening in a hotel in Rome. ‘We en- tered our room and found a cat there. Eisler furi- ously chased it out of the window and over the glass roof. He crashed the glass with his boot. A second later the waiter entered the room. Eisler turned to the waiter: “A thief was in the room; he fled through the window and crashed the glass”.’ What a gift is such quickness of reac- tion and association. Eisler’s art historical career was splendid but short. He could not resist to usurpate an illuminated from the Library in Udine and when caught withdrew to a sani- tarium. His further achievements confirmed his genius. His book on “Weltenmantel”43 brought him into the first row of theological scholars. When I was in my fourth year a student coming from Germany brought fresh blood in our Viennese lassitude, W. Koehler. He was younger than most of us, even younger than I by one and a half year.44 So our feelings for him were somewhat like for a pet (Nesthäckchen). We were amazed about his incredible innocence in every kind of life of a large city. His family was of Baltic stock and his father was the Librarian of the famous Wolfenbüttel Library a job which once Lessing held. He had studied with Dehio45 and told us with deep seriousness and conscious of his unusual tolerance that Dehio’s wife was a very acceptable person although she was a Jew- ess. It was the only jewess he had ever met. I informed him about the race of his colleagues. His allowance was a pittance and in order to save money he used to send his laundry by mail to Wolfenbüttel. His inexperience extended not only to Jews but also to bed bugs; we mad an ex- cursion to Budapest, going down the Danube by steamer. We had the typical Hungarian gulyash, highly spiced with paprika and drank with it the delicious local wine. We had taken rooms in a very cheap hotel and I spend the night sitting at the table, ceding the bed to its possessive resi- dents. My friend Ebenstein, acquainted with bed bugs from his military year, compared notes with me at breakfast. Koehler joined us rather late; he had spent a bad night: a rash bothered him so that he could not sleep, must have been from the spiced meal and the wine. His background was very different from ours, but he made quick progress in adjusting himself. He had been in a “Burschenschaft” and a stroke of a rapier had 42 Hier trügt Tietze-Conrats Erinnerung: Zwar war die 1910 von Ficker gegründete Zeitschrift „Der Brenner“ anfänglich auf Tiroler Dichter beschränkt, doch öffnete sie sich zusehends für Autoren des gesamten deutschen Sprachraums. Der expressionistische Dichter Georg Trakl (1887–1914) war gebürtiger Salzburger. 43 R. Eisler, Weltenmantel und Himmelszelt. Religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zur Urgeschichte des antiken Weltbildes, München 1910. 44 Wilhelm Köhler, geb. am 17.12.1884 in Reval/ Estland, gest. am 3.11.1959 in München. 45 Georg Dehio (1850–1932) hatte von 1892–1919 den Lehrstuhl für Kunstgeschichte an der Universität Straßburg inne.