Waltey
Bolha in profesor
Andersenove pravljice · Hans Christian AndersenO besedilu
Bolha in profesor
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- Hans Christian Andersen
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- 7 strani
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- Loppen og professoren
O izvirniku
Andersenove pravljice
Literarne pravljice z nežnostjo, bolečino in ostrim občutkom za čudežno. Bralni jezik je English, izvirnik pa prihaja iz vira Andersenove pravljice v jeziku Dansk.
Besedilo
Bolha in profesor
There was once a balloonist who came to a bad end: his balloon burst, and he fell to the ground and was dashed to pieces. Two minutes earlier he had sent his son down by parachute, which was the boy’s good fortune. He was unhurt and went about with all the knowledge he needed to become a balloonist, but he had no balloon and no money to get one.
He had to live, so he took to conjuring tricks and learned to speak from his belly, which is called being a ventriloquist. He was young and good-looking, and when he grew a moustache and acquired some fine clothes, he might have passed for a count’s son. The ladies thought him handsome; indeed, one young woman was so taken with his beauty and his clever tricks that she followed him to foreign towns and countries. There he called himself a professor; nothing less would do.
His constant thought was to get himself a balloon and sail into the sky with his little wife, but they did not yet have the money. “It will come!” he said. “If only it would!” she said.
“We’re young people, after all! And now I’m a professor. Even crumbs are bread!” She helped him faithfully, sitting at the door selling tickets to the performance, which was a chilly pleasure in winter. She also helped him with one of his tricks. He put his wife into a table drawer, a very large drawer. She crawled into the compartment at the back, and then she could not be seen in the one at the front. It was like an optical illusion.
But one evening, when he pulled out the drawer, she had vanished from his life as well. She was not in the front compartment, not in the back compartment, not anywhere in the house, neither to be seen nor heard. That was her conjuring trick. She never came back. She had grown tired of it all, and he grew miserable, lost his good spirits, and could no longer laugh and make jokes, so the audiences stopped coming. His earnings dwindled, and his clothes grew shabby. In the end he owned nothing but a large flea, a legacy from his wife, and that was why he was so fond of it. So he trained it, taught it clever tricks, taught it to present arms and fire a cannon—a little one, of course.
The professor was proud of the flea, and the flea was proud of himself. He had learned something, had human blood in him, and had been to the greatest cities, been seen by princes and princesses, and won their gracious applause. It had all been printed in newspapers and on posters. He knew that he was a celebrity and could support a professor, indeed a whole family.
Proud he was, and famous he was, and yet, when he and the professor travelled, they went fourth class on the railway. It arrives just as quickly as first. There was an unspoken vow between them that they would never part and never marry: the flea would remain a bachelor and the professor a widower. That made things even.
“Where you have had your greatest success,” said the professor, “you must never go twice!” He understood human nature, and that is a kind of knowledge too. At last he had travelled through every country except the land of the savages. So he decided to go to the land of the savages. It was true that they ate Christians there, as the professor knew, but he was not quite a Christian, and the flea was not quite a human being, so he thought they might safely travel there and make a good profit.
They travelled by steamship and sailing ship. The flea performed his tricks, which earned them free passage along the way, and they reached the land of the savages. A little princess ruled there. She was only eight years old, but she ruled all the same. She had taken power from her father and mother, for she had a will of her own and was quite wonderfully lovely and naughty.
The moment the flea presented arms and fired his cannon, she became so taken with him that she said, “Him or no one!” She went quite wild with love, and she was a savage already.
“Sweet, sensible little child!” said her father. “If only one could make a man of him first!” “Leave that to me, old man!” she said, which was not a nice way for a little princess to speak to her father, but she was a savage.
She set the flea on her little hand. “Now you are a man, and you shall rule with me, but you must do as I wish, or I shall kill you and eat the professor.”
The professor was given a great hall to live in. The walls were made of sugar cane, which he could walk about licking, but he had no sweet tooth. He was given a hammock to sleep in, and it was like lying in a balloon, the thing he had always longed for and constantly thought about.
The flea stayed with the princess, sitting on her little hand and on her delicate neck. She plucked a hair from her head and made the professor tie it round the flea’s leg, and so she kept him tethered to the large piece of coral she wore in her earlobe.
What a delightful time it was for the princess, and for the flea too, she thought. But the professor was not content. He was a traveller, and loved roaming from town to town and reading in the newspapers about his patience and ingenuity in teaching a flea every human accomplishment. Day in and day out he lay in his hammock, idling and eating his fine food: fresh birds’ eggs, elephants’ eyes, and roast legs of giraffe. Cannibals do not live on human flesh alone; that is a delicacy. “A child’s shoulder with a sharp sauce,” said the princess’s mother, “is the most delicate dish of all.”
The professor was bored and longed to leave the land of the savages, but he had to take the flea with him, for the flea was his marvel and his livelihood. How was he to catch him and get him away? That was not so easy.
He strained all his powers of thought, and then he said, “Now I have it!” “Father of the princess, grant me something to do! May I teach the people of this country to present arms? That is what they call culture in the greatest countries of the world!”
“And what can you teach me?” asked the princess’s father. “My greatest art,” said the professor, “to fire a cannon so that the whole earth trembles and all the most delicious birds in the sky fall down ready-roasted! That is what I call a bang!”
“Bring the cannon!” said the princess’s father. But there was no cannon in the whole country except the one the flea had brought, and that was too small. “I shall cast a larger one!” said the professor. “Only give me what I need! I must have fine silk, needle and thread, ropes and cords, and stomach drops for balloons; they make them swell and rise and soar. They provide the bang in the cannon’s belly.”
He was given everything he asked for. The whole country gathered to see the great cannon. The professor did not summon them until he had the balloon quite ready to be filled and sent aloft.
The flea sat on the princess’s hand and watched. The balloon was filled; it swelled and could scarcely be held down, so wild was it. “I must take it up into the air to cool it off,” said the professor, and he climbed into the basket hanging beneath it. “I cannot manage to steer it alone. I must take a knowledgeable companion to help me. There is no one here who can do that except the flea!”
“I am very reluctant to allow it!” said the princess, but she handed the flea to the professor all the same, and he set him on his hand. “Let go of the cords and ropes!” he said. “There goes the balloon!”
They thought he said, “The cannon!” And the balloon rose higher and higher, up above the clouds, away from the land of the savages. The little princess, her father and mother, and all the people stood waiting. They are waiting still, and if you do not believe it, travel to the land of the savages yourself. Every child there talks of the flea and the professor and believes they will return when the cannon has cooled down. But they will not return; they are at home here with us, in their native land, travelling by railway, first class, not fourth. They make a good living and have a large balloon. No one asks how they came by the balloon or where they got it. They are people of means, respected people, the flea and the professor.
Izvirnik
Loppen og professoren
Naslednje strani prikazujejo izvirno besedilo za primerjavo.
Eventyr af Hans Christian Andersen
Der var en luftskipper, ham gik det galt, ballonen sprak, manden dumpede og slog sig i stykker. Sin dreng havde han to minutter forud sendt ned med faldskærm, det var drengens lykke. Han var uskadt og gik om med store kundskaber til at blive luftskipper, men han havde ikke ballon og ikke midler til at skaffe sig denne.
Leve måtte han, og så lagde han sig efter behændighedskunster, og at kunne tale med maven, det kaldes at være bugtaler. Ung var han og så godt ud, og da han fik mundskæg og kom i gode klæder, kunne han antages for et grevebarn. Damerne fandt ham smuk, ja en jomfru blev så betaget af hans dejlighed og hans behændighedskunst, at hun fulgte med ham til fremmede byer og lande. Der kaldte han sig professor, mindre kunne det ikke være.
Hans stadige tanke var at få sig en luftballon og gå til vejrs med sin lille kone, men de havde endnu ikke midlerne.
"De kommer!" sagde han.
"Bare de ville!" sagde hun.
"Vi er jo unge folk! og nu er jeg professor. Smuler er også brød!"
Hun hjalp ham troligt, sad ved døren og solgte billetter til forestillingen, og det var en kold fornøjelse om vinteren. Hun hjalp ham også i et kunststykke. Han puttede sin kone i bordskuffen, en stor bordskuffe. Der krøb hun ind i bagskuffen, og så var hun ikke at se i forskuffen. Det var som en øjenforblændelse.
Men en aften da han trak skuffen ud, var hun også borte fra ham. Hun var ikke i forskuffen, ikke i bagskuffen, ikke i hele huset, ikke at se, ikke at høre. Det var hendes behændighedskunst. Hun kom aldrig igen. Hun var ked af det, og han blev ked i det, tabte sit gode humør, kunne ikke mere le og gøre løjer, og så kom der ingen folk. Fortjenesten blev dårlig, klæderne blev dårlige. Han ejede til sidst kun en stor loppe, et arvegods efter konen, og derfor holdt han så meget af den. Så dresserede han den, lærte den behændighedskunster, lærte den at præsentere gevær og skyde en kanon af, men lille.
Professoren var stolt af loppen, og den var stolt af sig selv. Den havde lært noget og havde menneskeblod og været i de største byer, var blevet set af prinser og prinsesser, havde vundet deres høje bifald. Det stod trykt i aviser og på plakater. Den vidste, at den var en berømthed og kunne ernære en professor, ja en hel familie.
Stolt var den og berømt var den, og dog, når den og professoren rejste, tog de på jernbane fjerde plads. Den kommer lige så hurtig som første. Det var et stiltiende løfte, at de aldrig ville skilles ad, aldrig gifte sig, loppen ville forblive ungkarl og professoren enkemand. Det går lige op.
"Hvor man gør størst lykke," sagde professoren, "der skal man ikke komme to gange!" Han var en menneskekender og det er også en kundskab.
Til sidst havde han berejst alle lande, uden de vildes land. Og så ville han til de vildes land. Der æder de rigtignok kristne mennesker, vidste professoren, men han var ikke rigtig kristen og loppen var ikke rigtig menneske, så mente han, at de nok turde rejse der og have en god fortjeneste.
De rejste med dampskib og med sejlskib. Loppen gjorde sine kunster, og så havde de fri rejse undervejs og kom til de vildes land.
Her regerede en lille prinsesse, hun var kun otte år, men hun regerede. Hun havde taget magten fra fader og moder, for hun havde en vilje og var så mageløs yndig og uartig.
Straks, da loppen præsenterede gevær og skød kanonen af, blev hun så indtagen i loppen, at hun sagde: "Ham eller ingen!" Hun blev ganske vild af kærlighed og var jo allerede vild i forvejen.
"Søde, lille, fornuftige barn!" sagde hendes fader, "kunne man først gøre et menneske af den!"
"Det lader du mig om, gamle!" sagde hun, og det var ikke net sagt af en lille prinsesse, der taler til sin fader, men hun var vild.
Hun satte loppen på sin lille hånd.
"Nu er du et menneske, regerende med mig, men du skal gøre hvad jeg vil, ellers slår jeg dig ihjel og spiser professoren."
Professoren fik en stor sal at bo i. Væggene var af sukkerrør, dem kunne han gå og slikke, men han var ikke slikmund. Han fik en hængekøje at sove i, det var, som lå han i en luftballon, den han altid havde ønsket sig, og som var hans stadige tanke.
Loppen blev hos prinsessen, sad på hendes lille hånd og på hendes fine hals. Hun havde taget et hår af sit hoved, det måtte professoren binde loppen om benet, og så holdt hun den bunden til det store koralstykke, hun havde i øreflippen.
Hvor var det en dejlig tid for prinsessen, også for loppen, tænkte hun, men professoren fandt sig ikke tilfreds, han var rejsemand, holdt af at drage fra by til by, læse i aviserne om sin udholdenhed og kløgt i at lære en loppe al menneskelig gerning. dag ud og ind lå han i hængekøjen, dovnede og fik sin gode føde: friske fugleæg, elefantøjne og stegte giraflår. Menneskeæderne lever ikke kun af menneskekød, det er en delikatesse. "Barneskulder med skarp sovs," sagde prinsessemoderen, "er det mest delikate."
Professoren kedede sig og ville gerne bort fra de vildes land, men loppen måtte han have med, den var hans vidunder og levebrød. Hvorledes skulle han fange og få den. Det var ikke så let.
Han anspændte alle sine tænkeevner og så sagde han: "Nu har jeg det!"
"Prinsessefader: Forund mig noget at bestille! Må jeg indøve landets beboere i at præsentere, det er det man i verdens største lande kalder dannelse!"
"Og hvad kan du lære mig!" spurgte prinsessefaderen.
"Min største kunst," sagde professoren, "at fyre en kanon af så hele jorden bæver, og alle himlens lækreste fugle falder stegte ned! Det er der knald ved!"
"Kom med kanonen!" sagde prinsessefaderen.
Men i hele landet var der ingen kanon, uden den loppen havde bragt, og den var for lille.
"Jeg støber en større!" sagde professoren. "Giv mig bare midlerne! Jeg må have fint silketøj, nål og tråd, tov og snor, samt mavedråber for luftballoner, de blæser op, letter og løfter. De giver knaldet i kanonmaven."
Alt hvad han forlangte fik han.
Hele landet kom sammen for at se den store kanon. Professoren kaldte ikke, før han havde ballonen hel færdig til at fylde og gå op.
Loppen sad på prinsessens hånd og så til. Ballonen blev fyldt, den bovnede og kunne næppe holdes, så vild var den.
"Jeg må have den til vejrs, at den kan blive afkølet," sagde professoren og satte sig i kurven, der hang under den. "Ene kan jeg ikke magte at styre den. Jeg må have en kyndig kammerat med, for at hjælpe mig. Her er ingen der kan det uden loppen!"
"Jeg tillader det nødig!" sagde prinsessen, men rakte dog loppen til professoren, som satte den på sin hånd.
"Slip snore og tov!" sagde han. "Nu går ballonen!"
De troede han sagde: "kanonen!"
Og så gik ballonen højere og højere, op over skyerne, bort fra de vildes land.
Den lille prinsesse, hendes fader og moder, hele folket med stod og ventede. De venter endnu, og tror du det ikke, så rejs til de vildes land, der taler hvert barn om loppen og professoren, tror at de kommer igen, når kanonen er kølet af, men de kommer ikke, de er hjemme hos os, de er i deres fædreland, kører på jernbane, første plads, ikke fjerde. De har god fortjeneste, stor ballon. Ingen spørger, hvorledes de har fået ballonen eller hvorfra de har den, de er holdne folk, hædrede folk, loppen og professoren.
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