On the way to the American embassy

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On the way to the American embassy is a story by Anna Seghers that was written around 1929 and appeared in the collection of the same name in Berlin in 1930. The author describes a mass demonstration in a large city against the controversial conviction of the two anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti for murder and robbery by a court in Massachusetts

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Vanzetti (left) and Sacco (right)

After the headline in the extra sheet “She was brought back to the house of the dead!”, The demonstration in the story for a postponement of the execution takes place on August 22, 1927: “You have to go to the embassy before the appointed time [at two o'clock] arrive". The march with red flags and banners against "class justice" begins at the city's west train station and runs through business districts, residential areas, across squares and crossroads, through avenues, along the riverbank, over bridges, sometimes haltingly, sometimes at a run, hindered by police chains american embassy.

For her description, the author picks out a series of four with typifying names: the man, the woman and the little ones. The three belong to the core of the movement. The stranger comes in fourth. Her associations with those condemned to death, which are faded into the course of the plot, reveal fragments of her private life:

  • The man who is called by a friend Stephan who joins the train is a railroad worker and thinks of the death house at the Westbahnhof with his son Stephan, "the crushed, the buried", who died in an accident. He is bitter and disaffected because the union did not send a representative to the funeral and left him and his worn-out wife alone. Nevertheless he takes part in the demonstration, but he doubts the success of the action to prevent the execution of Sacco and Vancetti, "he cannot help them and they cannot help him". He is secretly hoping for an early termination by the police in order to have time for a secret private pleasure, for which he keeps money in his pocket. On the other hand, the thoughts of the son's death are connected with the protest against the execution, he sings a battle song and becomes increasingly committed.
  • The woman “the man” is also marked by hard work and private misfortune and, like the man, marches along rather dutifully. At the beginning she doesn't even know the reason for the march and is reluctant to ask why. Gradually she remembers photographs of the two convicts and associates this with the sight of her late husband Paul, who "... is like the one walking next to her, so grumpy and dry as stone." She works all day and sees hers three children only when they are asleep. During the night she is already “dead tired from the day that has not even come”: “The tiredness was curdled in black spots on her gray face.” Often she has no time to look after the children Johann because of the union activities To take care of Gustav and Anna and therefore has a guilty conscience. A basic experience of her female life is the fear of being pregnant and having to have an abortion. Often she hadn't felt like it because they had already "squeezed everything sweet ... out of her", but she was happy that someone else wanted something from her.
  • The little one is the son of a fruit seller. But instead of helping the father with his fig cart, he leaves this task to his sister Marie and demonstrates with a red cloth. When it comes to the reputation of the newspaper seller, he would prefer to take the place of the two anarchists. He knows the routes of the train and the bottlenecks on the line, keeps arranging the rows and cheering on the marchers. Like other demonstrators, he changed his mind about their success several times in the course of the plot: “His heart contracted in a desperate effort that would have been enough to perform sacred, superhuman deeds, fell apart again in tired, indifferent grief. You will surely die. ”But then he is confident again that the demonstrators will arrive at their destination and prevent the execution, while other participants fear that the police will block the streets and they will run around in circles.
  • The stranger is initially observed critically by the three. He took the family off for a week that he would like to have all to himself, took the night train to the big city and suddenly got caught up in this demonstration. First he wants to break out of line and pursue his inclinations far away from the crowd and, like in sleep, which is not accounted for in life, an “unfulfillable, crazy wish of his youth, the violent desire kept secret in shame and fear, the last hope of the last Years: to go into town alone ”,“ but the others take him, the three in his row who would then be without him ”and he feels an obligation to do something for the newspaper seller's reputation do the condemned. So he holds his place when someone tries to push him away. The crowd pushes him forward, does not release him and he has a sense of community now and then, but “[t] he alley was dark with fear.” The two towers, which he saw with delight at first, are symbols for the city of his longing. During the move he can see them from different perspectives and then moves further and further away from them.

As the demonstrators approach the embassy, ​​mounted police try to block their way and break up the train. The four of them tried to break through the chains with the crowd, shots were fired, one of them hit the stranger, he fell and stayed where he was. "As if he had been born here, the city collapsed over him, legs and skirts, sky and houses." battered and bloody ”, shout“ Sacco, Vancetti ”. There are arguments, the woman's body is "kneaded" into the forecourt and finally her face is "pressed against the gilded bars of the gate. Sullenness fell like mortar from the man's face. It was impossible that there was even a corner in the whole house where you couldn't hear her calling. "

Narrative form

The plot is told in personal form from the perspective of the four people, i.e. the protagonists are the reflective figures of the events presented in the Er-form: only what they perceive on their way through the city is described: the residents looking out of the windows, the passers-by and café-house visitors at the roadside, the movement of the train, the expressions of opinion and speculations of the protesters in the neighboring rows about the police operation and the expected barriers, the slogans, songs and appeals of the stewards. The internal actions of the protagonists in lived speech or internal monologues or in a kind of stream of consciousness are faded into the actions alternately and often merging .

reception

  • The theme - the feelings of the individual in the crowd - is characteristic of works of word art and film in the 1920s . Hilzinger sees the missing narrator comment as a means to deepen the reader's presence at the demonstration, which apparently runs in real time. Hilzinger draws attention to a special impression. The four demonstrators do not discuss anything essential, but it is precisely the togetherness in the line of marches that gives the stranger a great, yet unknown, attitude towards life. Leaving the four demonstrators in the nameless state serves to draw types; not of characters.
  • 1988, Anette Barkowski: “At the intersection of history and female identity. Anna Seghers´ story On the way to the American embassy "

literature

Text output

Used edition
  • On the way to the American embassy . S. 158-183 in: Anna Seghers: Erzählungen 1926-1944. Volume IX of the collected works in separate editions . 367 pages. Aufbau-Verlag Berlin 1981 (2nd edition), without ISBN

Secondary literature

  • Heinz Neugebauer: Anna Seghers. Life and work. With illustrations (research assistant: Irmgard Neugebauer, editorial deadline September 20, 1977). 238 pages. Series “Writers of the Present” (Ed. Kurt Böttcher). People and Knowledge, Berlin 1980, without ISBN
  • Kurt Batt : Anna Seghers. Trial over development and works. With illustrations. 283 pages. Reclam, Leipzig 1973 (2nd edition 1980). Licensor: Röderberg, Frankfurt am Main ( Röderberg-Taschenbuch Vol. 15), ISBN 3-87682-470-2
  • Barkowski, Anette: At the intersection of history and female identity. Anna Seghers' story "On the way to the American embassy" ; Acta Germanica 19/1988: 96-113.
  • Ute Brandes: Anna Seghers . Colloquium Verlag, Berlin 1992. Volume 117 of the series “Heads of the 20th Century”, ISBN 3-7678-0803-X
  • Andreas Schrade: Anna Seghers . Metzler, Stuttgart 1993 (Metzler Collection, Vol. 275 (Authors)), ISBN 3-476-10275-0
  • Sonja Hilzinger: Anna Seghers. With 12 illustrations. Series of Literature Studies. Reclam, Stuttgart 2000, RUB 17623, ISBN 3-15-017623-9
  • Friedrich Albrecht: Efforts. Works on the work of Anna Segher 1965-2004.   Peter Lang Bern u. a. 2005.

Remarks

  1. ↑ While Neugebauer (Neugebauer, p. 21, 6. Zvo) claims that the city is Paris, Schrade (Schrade, p. 19, 11. Zvu) claims to have recognized Berlin. Hilzinger (Hilzinger, p. 95, 5. Zvo) is unsure and gives Berlin and Paris a question mark. The text speaks of a river bank on which the message lies. The decision could perhaps be made by answering the following question: Was the American embassy on the Seine in 1927 and then on the Spree ? Embassy of the United States in Paris / Embassy of the United States in Berlin
  2. ^ Batt (Batt, p. 58, 15. Zvu) emphasizes the inner monologue as a new stylistic device of Anna Seghers. So far, fairy-tale , hyperbolic and lyrical echoes to illustrate the inner unconscious have dominated her prose .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Edition used, p. 364, entry “On the way to the American embassy” .
  2. ↑ Friedrich Albrecht: “Efforts. Works on the work of Anna Segher 1965-2004. “Peter Lang Bern u. a. 2005.
  3. ↑ Edition used, p. 160, 15. Zvo
  4. ↑ Edition used, p. 170, 2nd Zvu
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 177, 10th Zvu
  6. ↑ Edition used, p. 166, 18. Zvu and 8. Zvu
  7. ↑ Edition used, p. 166, 3rd Zvu
  8. ↑ Edition used, p. 167, 12. Zvo
  9. ↑ Edition used, p. 173, 4th Zvu
  10. ↑ Edition used, p. 181, 7. Zvo
  11. ↑ Edition used, p. 183, 5. Zvo
  12. ↑ Brandes, p. 36, 3rd Zvu
  13. ↑ Hilzinger, p. 96, 1. Zvo
  14. ↑ Hilzinger, p. 95
  15. ^ Schrade, p. 19, 5th Zvu
  16. ↑ quoted in Hilzinger, p. 214, seventh entry