'He lives the life of a real bohemian intellectual. Washing, grooming and changing his linen are things he does rarely …' This could be a description of me, W. says, were it not for the word 'intellectual'. In fact, it is a report about Marx from a Prussian police spy. But then I'm not much of a bohemian either, W. says. At least there's some grandeur to the Bohemian's dissipation.
'Though he is often idle for days on end, he will work day and night with tireless endurance when he has a great deal of work to do'. A great deal of work – if only we had that, W. says. If only the sense of something urgent to communicate, something on which would steer us through the days and nights!
'He has no fixed times for going to sleep and waking up. He often stays up all night, and then lies down fully clothed on the sofa at midday and sleeps till evening, untroubled by the comings and goings of the whole world'. W. lies on the sofa at midday, he says, but then he hasn't worked through the night with tireless endurance. Oh, what it would be to lie down, sleep as untroubledly as a child, knowing that one had done some real work!
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