Mother Night Chapter 29 Summary

Adolf Eichmann and Me…

  • Two: the number of days Campbell stays in the basement recovering.
  • One: the number of new outfits Campbell is given because his own were seriously messed up when he was beaten.
  • Three: the number of wheels—erm, people—headed out in the great escape from the U.S. (Hint: it's Campbell, Resi, and Kraft.)
  • Zero: the number of conversations in which Campbell gets a say in where they're going.
  • And that concludes our Exposition-by-Numbers portion of this chapter.
  • Up next is a quick survey of newspaper headlines in which we learn that Israel wants people to know that Campbell's propaganda leads to murder, Campbell's citizenship is in question, the U.S. government is surprised to learn Campbell is stateside, and O'Hare wants to be the one to gut—ahem—apprehend him.
  • We also get a fun and fancy ekphrastic depiction of a beatific portrait taken by Arndt Klopfer. This guy was a photographer in Germany who photographed all the Nazis with halos around their heads.
  • Turns out that Campbell got his portrait taken just after Adolf Eichmann did in 1941. This was the first time Campbell met Eichmann.
  • Encounter numero dos occurred two weeks before Campbell wrote the chapter we are currently Shmooping.
  • Campbell and Eichmann were both in Tel Aviv. They were both prisoners. Their guards wanted to set up a meet and greet.
  • Eichmann was straight-up ebullient, and he just kept grinning like a baby. He was excited to meet a "writer" who could tell his story.
  • Not guilty in the least about the millions of murders he caused, Eichmann got seriously miffed when Campbell jokingly asked if he was going to plead "just following orders"—because, turns out, he was. Awkward.
  • The grim mood passed because they talked shop for a minute about the best way to be a productive writer.
  • Once in Jerusalem, Campbell gets a secret note from Eichmann. He wants to know if he should get a literary agent.