‘Don’t even try’, concluded the Langue-de-Feu. ‘Even I, your most intimate enemy, would be terribly upset to see you fall into disgrace… say your prayers in German as usual, and go to bed.’

‘But,’ I objected, ‘My prayers – I’ve always said them in French.’

‘It’s been a long time since then, old boy. Up there,’ (he indicated a little cloud sailing in the azure sky), ‘they’ve long been used to hearing you speak in German. If you change your language, they won’t recognise you any longer… and, well, as they’re gods after all, what then do you hope of men?’

René Schickele, 1938, as published in “Das Wort hat einen neuen Sinn” (Mitteldeutscher Verlag, 2014). Translated from the French.