Adolf.[After a pause.] Yes. And I’ve felt about all this, that the only reason why my views were so awfully repugnant to her, was because they were mine, not because they appeared absurd on their intrinsic merits. For it often happened that she’d trot out my old ideas, and champion them with gusto as her own. Why, it even came about that one of my friends gave her ideas which he had borrowed direct from me. She found them delightful, she found everything delightful that didn’t come from me.
Gustav. In other words, you’re not truly happy.
Adolf. Oh, yes, I am. The woman’ whom I desired is mine, and I never wished for any other.
Gustav. Do you never wish to be free either?
Adolf. I wouldn’t like to go quite so far as that. Of course the thought crops up now and again, how calmly I should be able to live if I were free—but she scarcely leaves me before I immediately long for her again, as though she were my arm, my leg. Strange. When I’m alone I sometimes feel as though she didn’t have any real self of her own, as though she were a part of my ego, a piece out of my inside, that stole away all my will, all my joi de vvvre. Why, my very marrow itself, to use an anatomical expression, is situated in her; that’s what it seems like.
Gustav. Viewing the matter broadly, that seems quite plausible.
Adolf. Nonsense. An independent person like she is, with such a tremendous lot of personal views, and when I met her, what was I then? Nothing. An artistic child which she brought up.
Gustav. But afterward you developed her intellect and educated her, didn’t you?
Adolf. No; her growth remained stationary, and I shot up.
Gustav. Yes; it’s really remarkable, but her literary talent already began to deteriorate after her first book, or, to put it as charitably as possible, it didn’t develop any further. [He sits down opposite ADOLF on the sofa on the left.] Of course she then had the most promising subject matter—for of course she drew the portrait of her first husband—you never knew him, old man? He must have been an unmitigated ass.