Evening houses
Evening houses is a novel by Eduard von Keyserling that was published by Fischer, Berlin in 1914. In the same year it was published in the new Rundschau .
action
The young Baroness Fastrade von der Warthe becomes engaged to the young Baron Dietz von Egloff, a notorious gambler. When he needs her, she cannot help him because she has renounced him beforehand.
Houses
In the countryside, in Paduren, Sirow, Barnewitz and Witzow, not far from the town of Grobin , are the castles and country estates of long -established noble families.
characters
Padures
- Baron Siegwart von der Warthe, lord of the castle
- Baroness Fastrade von der Warthe, his daughter
Sirov
- Baroness Egloff
- Baron Dietz von Egloff, her son
Barnewitz
- Baroness Dachhausen
- Baron Fritz von Dachhausen, landowner, officer, her son
- Baroness Lydia (also: Liddy) von Dachhausen (née Birkmeier, daughter of a manufacturer), her daughter-in-law
Witzow
- Baron Port on Witzow
- Baroness Gertrud Port, his daughter
Retirement
The generation of fathers and mothers mourns the old times and gives up. Fastrade's aunt, the Baroness Arabella, describes the old people's situation as follows: “We have nothing to do but sit and wait until one after the other crumbles”. Fastrades brother Bolko was killed in a duel. Since then, the father, Baron Siegwart von der Warthe, has been a broken man. Warthe still defends his views, but he leaves those decisions that affect the daughter alone to her.
Egloff's mother, the old Baroness Egloff, likes to represent. When she is giving a big supper for the local society, she teaches her future daughter-in-law Fastrade verbatim how to prepare such an event as a woman of the house in order to have the process firmly under control. When the carefully prepared evening ends with the gentlemen and especially Egloff losing to a Russian in the playroom and neglecting their ladies completely, the "venerable kindness" is over. Suddenly the baroness stands there - with a face, “old and fearful”. The mother emphasizes to the son that as long as she is still there, she will see everything after him.
The Baroness Dachhausen left the regiment to the young people. She moved to Grobin with her daughter Adine and the old furniture. As soon as Dachhausen stops by, he is pampered by his mother and sister and can let himself go.
Baron Port auf Witzow is Warthe's old friend. Port visits Warta frequently. Together with his daughter Gertrud, he spreads gossip in all directions.
Egloff's generation
The novel is about Egloff's generation. These are the boys, in addition to Egloff, there are also Fastrade, Lydia, Dachhausen and Gertrud. Egloff once said to Fastrade: “Something has been missed in my entire generation around here. It was probably your father who liked to speak of the sacred calling of preserving the goods of his fathers ”. Young Egloff has absolutely no point in doing that. Asked by Fastrade why he recklessly cheered his groves at the gaming table, he replied after a brief reflection that he didn't know either. After pondering for a long time, he says that the special thing about the game is that decisions are made immediately - in contrast to everyday life, in which hardly anything changes. Egloff doesn't want to bequeath anything. Whom? Nevertheless, Egloff advertises Fastrade and is heard. Fastrade wants to cure the fiancé of his gambling passion and insists on improvement; takes him to prayer. Egloff, never at a loss for an answer, talks about his fiancée's past: How was it with the candidate, the head of house Arno Holst: “Did you love him?” He turns the tables. Fastrade has nothing to hide. At that time she left Paduren, hurried after Holst and remained loyal to him. But when her brother Bolko perished, she felt sorry for her father and returned home. Egloff does not give up and defines Fastrades love: "You want to educate, love is an educational instinct for you, a governess instinct". For Fastrade, to love means to help. But Egloff just wants to be loved. Despite all the differences and difficulties, Fastrade makes something of their engagement. She meets with Egloff in the forest. At home, the two old people, father and aunt, hardly believe their ears - Fastrade sings.
Sometimes Fastrade meets with the "sickly" Gertrud Port. Gertrud is also like Fastrade, who was “outside”. “What did it help? You're coming back, you can't live there, ”she is accused of. Apparently that's true. Gertrud was in Dresden at the "Singschule" and came back with "broken nerves". Gertrud loves the married Dachhausen. It's a one-sided, unhappy love.
Egloff has had a relationship with Lydia for a long time. Dachhausen's husband, a school friend of Egloff's, only finds out about the secret lovers after an incident puzzled him. The beloved wife Lydia passed out after learning of Fastrade's engagement to Egloff. When the tender creature has come to, it by no means accepts the new circumstances, but goes on the offensive. Lydia clings to Egloff like a burdock. In a furious debate, she tells him where she will be waiting for him every evening. The newly fiancé finally rides there. The disaster takes its course.
Dachhausen keeps its estate in good shape and is feared by the staff. The affair of his idolized wife, however, almost drives him crazy. He tracks down the two lovebirds and catches them. Dachhausen turned the wife out of the house. On the way to her mother, Lydia passes Fastrade in Paduren and confesses to her. The real reason for their coming: Fastrade is supposed to save the lover. Lydia is afraid the officer a. D. Dachhausen will kill Egloff in a duel. Fastrade gives Egloff the engagement ring back: “But now you don't belong to me anymore,” she says. During the duel, Dachhausen dies of a "shot in the lung". Egloff didn't even want to meet his school friend and complains: If Dachhausen had hit him the other way around, everything would be fine. Then Fastrade would feel sorry for him. Egloff, the player, hopelessly in debt, first shoots his good horse and then himself. Fastrade complains that she left the fiancé when he was in need.
Except for the ports on Witzow, every house has a young dead person to mourn.
shape
The described decline of the landed gentry depresses the reader. Even the best descriptions of nature do not help to overcome the omnipresent hopelessness. The framing of the novel at its beginning and end is bitter. Warthe and Port, the good old friends, meet at Paduren and ask: “Nothing new in the area?” Then they “laugh” “comfortably”.
Some narrative techniques are remarkable: The triangle Egloff-Lydia-Dachhausen only becomes aware of the reader late. In addition, this will be massively extended to Fastrade and even a little bit to Gertrud. Egloff's suicide is skilfully "ignored" and yet told in an acceptable manner. The minor characters are dealt with very briefly and still appear vivid - for example, the Russian Colonel of the Guard Count Schutow, the gentleman who makes Egloff poor by playing cards, introduces himself while he is entertaining a curious lady at a company: “Russia is terribly big, too a lot of space, before you know it, you are alone ... Now the ladies are needed, they make it tight and warm again ”.
literature
- source
- Eduard Graf von Keyserling: Evening houses. Novel . 175 pages. Göttingen 1998, ISBN 978-3-88243-614-3
- expenditure
- Eduard Graf von Keyserling: Evening houses. Novel . 116 pages. Zenodot Verlagsgesellschaft 2007, ISBN 978-3-86640-189-1
- Secondary literature
- Peter Sprengel : History of German-Language Literature 1900 - 1918. P. 365–366. Munich 2004
- Gero von Wilpert : Lexicon of world literature. German Authors A - Z . S. 331. Stuttgart 2004. 697 pages
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Steffen Brondke: Journal and book prints of the literary texts Keyserling . In: Eduard von Keyserling and classical modernism (= treatises on literary studies ). JB Metzler, Stuttgart 2020, ISBN 978-3-476-04892-9 , pp. 287-290 , doi : 10.1007 / 978-3-476-04892-9_19 .