Holzapfel

Holzapfel, a former classmate of Jakob Fabian, is a journalist at the Tagespost whose hectic routine and practical connections briefly open a path to work for Fabian. He is less a mentor than a busy intermediary: he can recommend Fabian, but cannot secure him a position or alter the newspaper’s preferences.

Identity and Work

Wenzkat directs Fabian to Holzapfel because he works at the Tagespost, where he is both a sports editor and a music critic. The recommendation establishes Holzapfel as a useful contact across several kinds of journalism, rather than as someone with a single, narrowly defined assignment.

When Fabian visits, Holzapfel is correcting proofs for a race preview and preparing a collected report on piano concertos. He drinks bottled beer as he works, moving between editorial tasks without pausing his routine. The scene makes his professional life tangible through its parallel demands: racing coverage, music criticism, proof correction, and the constant pressure of work.

Reunion and Recommendation

Holzapfel greets Fabian by his first name and asks where he has been, then complains in a rambling aside about being perpetually busy. His talk ranges from the hardening effects of work to aging children and younger girlfriends; even while speaking, he continues correcting copy and drinking. His manner combines familiarity with distraction, making the reunion feel less like a solemn return to friendship than a brief interruption in an already crowded working day.

He also supplies a compressed account of their former classmates. Koppel has divorced after discovering that his wife betrayed him with two other men, while Bretschneider has sold his pharmacy and taken up making red cabbage and boiled potatoes. Holzapfel’s brisk, comic recital treats changed lives as passing news, then turns back to the waiting proofs.

Fabian explains that he is looking for a job after working in propaganda and says that, at this point, he chiefly wants employment in the city. Holzapfel judges that Fabian knows neither music nor boxing, but suggests that the feuilleton might use him for a second theatre review or similar work. He telephones the director and sends Fabian to make his case in person, converting an old school connection into a limited professional opening.

Limits of His Help

The opportunity Holzapfel arranges is explicitly uncertain. Director Hanke says that no position is currently vacant, but offers Fabian two weeks of work at his own risk; if the feuilleton editor rejects his contributions, Fabian will have no claim on the job. Holzapfel has secured an introduction, not a promise of employment.

Fabian then proposes a different role, drawing on his advertising experience: he would advise advertisers, devise persuasive copy and campaigns, work with major clients on prize competitions, and organize public events such as boxing nights. Hanke replies that the newspaper’s major shareholders do not favor Berlin-style methods. The exchange underscores the gap between Holzapfel’s practical referral and Fabian’s preferred work: the contact can get him into the director’s office, but cannot make the institution receptive to his ideas.