The Condemned Man, incidentally, had an expression of such dog-like resignation that it looked as if one could set him free to roam around the slopes and would only have to whistle at the start of the execution for him to return.
reminds me of hester's monologue from scarlet letter
For his task is to stand up every time the clock strikes the hour and salute in front of the captain’s door.
Here at the head of the Bed warm rice pudding is put in this electrically heated bowl. From this the man, if he feels like it, can help himself to what he can lap up with his tongue. No one passes up this opportunity. I don’t know of a single one, and I have had a lot of experience.
Haven’t I spent hours trying to make the Commandant understand that a day before the execution there should be no more food served. But the new lenient administration has a different opinion. Before the man is led away, the Commandant’s women cram sugary things down his throat. His whole life he’s fed himself on stinking fish, and now he has to eat sweets! But that would be all right—I’d have no objections—but why don’t they get a new felt, the way I’ve been asking him for three months now? How can anyone take this felt into his mouth without feeling disgusted—something that a hundred man have sucked and bitten on it as they were dying?
i think the officer is just jelly
It did not look as if the Officer had been listening. “So the process has not convinced you,” he said to himself, smiling the way an old man smiles over the silliness of a child, concealing his own true thoughts behind that smile.
"the captain goes down with the ship" okay but that sounds dangerous