Salmonella men on Planet Porno: stories - By Yasutaka Tsutsui Page 0,66

the wedding. Maria Josepha caught smallpox from Mozart and died.

Mozart seems to have had an amorous nature. As young as twelve, he fell in love with a vain, foolish girl called Buffa, with whom he is said to have been consumed from spring to summer. Of course, he had various obstacles to overcome here.

When he was fourteen, Mozart went to Rome. There, he was profoundly moved on hearing a piece called ‘Miserere’ in a well-known chapel. That same evening, he wrote a composition of his own. But it was exactly the same as the ‘Miserere’ he’d heard in the afternoon, and was therefore never recognized as his own work.

In Rome, Pope Clement XIV made Mozart a “Knight of the Golden Spur”. But Mozart was physically weak. There is no mention of him performing as a knight after this, so we may infer that he refused the honour.

At the age of seventeen, Mozart again went to Vienna. There lived Joseph Haydn, who became engulfed in one of the whirlwinds that plagued the city. Mozart was also affected by it, and suffered serious injury. This whirlwind is known in German as “Sturm und Drang”.

Mozart is thought to have had some kind of extrasensory perception. When he was twenty-one, he had a premonition that the soprano Josepha Duschek was about to pay a visit from Prague, exclaiming “Ah! Io previdi” (Hey! I saw it coming!).

At twenty-two, Mozart fell in love with all four daughters of a man named Fridolin Weber. Although little is known of Mozart’s relationships with these four, common sense would suggest that it was merely an orgy, at most (sexual morals were not so strict in those days). Mozart’s favourite was the second daughter, Aloysia, but in the end he married the third, Constanze. This would suggest very strongly that it had indeed been an orgy.

In the same year, Mozart composed the symphony known as ‘K297’, as well as ‘Andante’ and a prelude called ‘Missing’.

When he was twenty-six, Mozart tried to marry Constanze. But she was whisked away to the palace of Friedrich Eugen, Duke of Württemberg. Overcoming a variety of hurdles, Mozart abducted Constanze, escaping with her from “the seraglio” and eventually marrying her.

But Constanze was a bad wife. She is said to have treated Mozart no better than a “goose of Cairo”. It is not clear to what this refers, but Mozart apparently saw himself as a “deluded bridegroom”.

Disillusioned, Mozart joined the secret society of the Freemasons at the age of twenty-eight, and took part in a conspiracy theory. He cantata’d his joy at this, while fighting off the CIA and the KGB. At one time he was a fugitive, pursued on a journey to Lied. But in November the organization was wiped out by the CIA. Mozart expressed his grief by composing the ‘Masonic Funeral Music’.

Mozart fell ever deeper into poverty from this time on. He studied to be a magician, and tried to make ends meet by taking side jobs, like “theatre manager”. But when his manservant Figaro upped and married in Prague without his permission, Mozart’s financial fortunes reached an even lower ebb. He became dependent on a person called Chloe, went around seducing women and acting like a right Don Juan, wrote musical jokes for the NHS, walked the streets naked shouting “Eine kleine Nachmusik!” and summoned the God of Death by playing his magic flute.

Mozart lived to the age of thirty-five. We know this, because he died when he was thirty-five. After his death, he wrote a “Requiem” for the repose of his soul.

The Last Smoker

I’m sitting on top of the parliament building, resisting tear-gas attacks from air force helicopters that circle above me like flies. I will soon enjoy my very last cigarette, my last show of resistance. My comrade, the painter Kusakabe, fell to his death just moments ago, leaving me alone as the last smoker remaining on earth. At this very moment, images of me – highlighted against the night sky by searchlights down below – are probably being relayed live across the country from TV cameras inside the helicopters.

I’ve got three packs left, and I refuse to die before I’ve finished them. So I’ve been chain-smoking two or three at a time. My head feels numb, my eyes are starting to spin. It’s only a matter of time before I, too, fall lifeless to the ground below.

It was only about fifteen or sixteen years ago that the anti-smoking movement started. And it was only six or seven years ago,