Bambi
Astory of the triumph of lust over sentimentality, set in Vienna, and culminating in an unusual crime passion- nel, has not received the attention it deserves. Herr Franz Stock, .a pensioner, was found dead with 15 stab wounds in the Wienerwald. His murderer was found lurk- ing near the scene of the crime and identified by his bloodstained antlers. He was only two years old: a deer named Hansi, whose humours had been so dis- ordered by the onset of the rutting season that he broke free from his owner, Herr Johann Strauss, and ran through the Wienerwald until he mistook Herr Stock for a rival deer. Herr Strauss, who is descTibed by Reuters as a keen hunter, shot Hansi after his guilt was established, since he feared that the deer might start to attack children. Herr Strauss had raised Hansi from the age of three weeks — presumably in partial atonement for shoot- ing his mother — but Hansi's brutish crime suggests that hunters should stick to killing, and not attempt sentimental gestures.
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