Catriona (Robert Louis Stevenson)

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William Brassey Hole 1893:
Illustration to Catriona

Catriona or David Balfour's Adventures at Home and Abroad ( English: Catriona ) is a historical adventure novel by the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson , which - completed in September 1892 in Upolu ( Samoa ) - from October 1892 to September 1893 in the literary London Atalanta monthly magazine was preprinted. Also in 1893, Cassell in London and Charles Scribner's Sons in New York brought out the work. The German translation by Marguerite Thesing was published by Buchenau & Reichert in Hamburg in 1926.

One of Stevenson's sources is said to have been the extensive history of Lion in Mourning ( "The Lion in Mourning" ), written by the Scottish Bishop Robert Forbes (1708–1775).

overview

The two-part novel is the seamless sequel to Abducted . Stevenson turned the wheel of history back a year. So Jakob Stuart alias Jakob von der Schlucht in the novel is not hanged as an Appin murderer at Ballachulish on November 8, 1752, as in reality , but to the day exactly one year before. The 16-year-old “upright naive” aristocratic David Balfour von Shaws, hero of the two novels, is an eyewitness to the Appin murder. He saw the sniper in Lettermore Forest and wants to prevent the miscarriage of justice. The Scottish clan justice does not want to know about this and prevents the appearance of the witness David Balfour. While the first part of the novel, which has just been outlined, is about Catriona in Scotland, in the second part the reader accompanies the hero to the continent together with the Scottish woman Catriona, who was born around 1733 . The journey leads to Leiden and France.

content

I. The Lord Prosecutor

The first-person narrator David Balfour, now wealthy, wants to become a lawyer. Before studying abroad, he spent three more months in Scotland. On the afternoon of August 25, 1751, David addresses the tall, pretty, gray-eyed Catriona Macgregor-Drummond in the street in Edinburgh . The two young people quickly get closer because David knows Catriona's uncle Robin Oig Macgregor. Jacob More Macgregor alias Jacob Drummond is shown into the house of the Lord Prosecutor of Scotland, William Grant, Esquire of Prestongrange. The prisoner is Catriona's father.

With a letter of recommendation from his “kin-mate”, the professor of moral philosophy Balfour of Pilrig, in his pocket, David seeks the Lord Prosecutor Grant and reveals himself to be the stranger “who spoke to Glenure when he was shot”. In the same breath, David admits that he was in the company of wanted Alan Breck Stuart. For the latter admission alone, Lord Attorney Grant would have to arrest his young visitor. Amazingly, he set him free. When David has to come back to Grant the next day, he meets a well-known prisoner there: Catriona's father. David is ashamed of Jakob More, because he acts like a beggar. David does not tell the reader what exactly was discussed between him and Jakob More, but he considers the leader of a "band of robbers" to be his mortal enemy. During the interrogation by the Junker of Lovat Simon Fraser, it becomes clear what a dangerous position David has got himself into when he admitted to having been at the scene with Alan Breck Stuart at the time of the Appin murder. As an investigator into the murder, Fraser cites coherent facts that make David pale. In addition, Jakob Stuart's followers were in prison, who were happy to testify against David and Alan on request in order to save their skin. Again David is released. He now fears the gallows and wants to talk to Catriona, the girl from the "wicked clan" to whom he feels so drawn. He looks for her in the village of Dean, but only meets an aunt Catrionas, to whom he reveals his misfortune.

The trial of Jakob Stuart will be carried out in Inveraray , the stronghold of "Campbell's vengeance". Lord Attorney Grant still wants David to be a witness in this criminal case. But it turns out differently. Alan Breck Stuart is hiding in a Scottish haystack. David can't imagine Alan as the Appin killer and smuggles him out of the country because of that. Alan gives his friend his address at Karl Stuart von Ardshiel's in Melun , Isle de France . Immediately after the rescue operation, David is kidnapped on Gullane Beach by " highland cattle thieves" on the island of Bass Rock in the Firth of Forth . David suspects that the threads of the "dirty intrigue" run together with Fraser or the devious Grant. Indeed - punctually for the end of the Inveraray trial, the kidnapped man is released. David rides quickly to Inveraray and intrigues unsuccessfully against Grant. The sly lord prosecutor answers the attack with kindness. David enjoys his hospitality for two months. Barbara Grant, one of the host's beautiful, witty daughters, gives the guest the nobility of education the necessary polish for studying law. It turns out Barbara and Catriona are cousins.

Catriona had freed her father from prison. Jakob More remains free. He turns out to be one of Grant's or Fraser's henchmen. It was Jakob More's people who had kidnapped David to the island. Jakob More had been rewarded for the criminal offense.

II. Father and Daughter

David travels to Holland in the winter of 1752. He wants to study law in Leiden . During the crossing he takes care of Catriona. The girl follows the father who emigrated to the continent. Because Jakob More is neither a talent for organization nor reliable, David and Catriona have to live in two adjoining rooms like brother and sister until the family reunites. When the father finally shows up and learns that David has become even more wealthy through the death of his uncle, he wants to marry the two young people. Both David and Catriona resist. But the couple found themselves without paternal blackmail. Before the happy ending, the old sinner Jakob More commits another betrayal in Dunkirk before he blesses the temporal in Paris . In January 1752, Jakob More lures Alan Breck Stuart to the beach to have him kidnapped to England. However, no English enemy is equal to the foxious cunning of Stuart.

Self-testimony

"I will never write a better book than Catriona ."

shape

After reading the novel, questions remain; For example: First, why was Catriona's father, Jakob More - formerly a campaigner for Scotland's independence from England - imprisoned? Second, in return for what betrayal was he released? David comments on this indefinitely: "... he" [Jakob More] "had offered his testimony in the Appinian trial, which - under a pretext - had been used to influence the jury." Why does the narrator David leave some questions open ? A succinct and incontestable answer would be: David doesn't know. So he can only wonder: Why did the Lord Public Prosecutor keep setting him free? On the crossing to Holland, Catriona told him that she had gone to Grant and asked for his life on her knees. Catriona ignores the assumption in silence.

Stevenson uses the style element of repetition. For example, in the first part of the novel, Captain Palliser cruises on the sea ​​horse off the rocky island of Bass. And at the end of the novel, Palliser's ship is lying in front of Dunkirk because Alan Breck Stuart is about to be kidnapped.

Stevenson really messed up the happy ending mentioned above. Quote: "We both want to get married." With these words she [Catriona] pressed my [David's] hand ". A thoroughly happy married life between David and Catriona can be gleaned from the last section of the final chapter. Because David tells this whole story to their children Barbara and Alan Balfour.

reception

  • Dölvers skips the novel with one sentence: " Catriona (1893) is a weaker form of Kidnapped and appears in some editions together with this under the title The Adventures of David Balfour ."
  • Reinbold calls the work a "psychologizing development novel " and discovers an autobiographical reference. Stevenson portrayed his childhood sweetheart, Edinburgh demi-world lady Kate Drummond.

German-language literature

expenditure

  • Catriona . Translator: Marguerite Thesing. Adolf Saal Verlag, Hamburg 1948, DNB 454881592 .
  • Catriona. The adventures of the brave lad David Balfour. Novel. Translator: Eva Schumann. Structure, Berlin 1957, DNB 454881606 .
  • Robert Louis Stevenson: Catriona or David Balfour's adventures at home and abroad. Translated from the English by Eva Schumann . Rolf Müller translated the verse inserts. With an afterword by Günther Klotz . (Dieterich Collection, Volume 337). 1st edition. Dieterich'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Leipzig 1969, DNB 458245852 .
  • The Adventures of David Balfour II. Catriona. Translated from the English by Marguerite Thesing. Bastei-Lübbe (vol. 10182), Bergisch Gladbach 1982, ISBN 3-404-10182-2 . (Licensor: Diogenes Zurich)
  • Catriona. More adventures of David Balfour . Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg 1983, ISBN 3-473-38879-3 .
  • The Adventures of David Balfour (includes: The Abduction. Catriona ). Translator: Richard Mummendey . dtv, Munich 1983. Thin print, ISBN 3-423-02049-0 .

Secondary literature

  • Horst Dölvers: The narrator Robert Louis Stevenson. Interpretations. Francke Verlag, Bern 1969, DNB 456469621 .
  • Michael Reinbold: Robert Louis Stevenson. Rowohlt, Reinbek 1995, ISBN 3-499-50488-X .
  • Oliver Kellner, Ulf Marek: Seewolf & Co .: Robinson Crusoe, Lederstrumpf, David Balfour, Mathias Sandorf, Tom Sawyer - ZDF's big four-part adventure series. Schwarzkopf and Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-89602-632-1 .

Web links

English

Wikisource: Catriona  - Sources and full texts (English)

Remarks

  1. ^ Other title: David Balfour .
  2. ^ Lion in Mourning , published in 1859, contains reports from eyewitnesses of the Battle of Culloden .
  3. ↑ The presiding judge of the criminal trial was the Duke of Argyle , head of Clan Campbell , the clan to which the victim of the Appin murder belonged. Of the 15 men on the jury, 11 were Campbell's ( Appin's murderers ).
  4. ↑ Robin Oig Macgregor is one of Rob Roy's sons .
  5. ↑ James MacGregor Drummond is Rob Roy's eldest son ( Catriona ).
  6. ↑ The victim of the Appin murder was Colin Roy Campbell of Glenure ( Appin murderer ).
  7. ↑ The narrator David from the Lowlands sometimes looks contemptuously at the people of the Highlands .
  8. ↑ Edition used.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Reinbold, p. 128, 5th Zvu and p. 132, 1st Zvo and Klotz in the afterword of the edition used, p. 345, 11th Zvo
  2. ↑ Reinbold, p. 152, 5th entry
  3. ↑ The lion in mourning engl. Vol. 1 , Vol. 2 , Vol. 3
  4. ↑ Padhraic O'Dochartaigh in Kellner and Marek
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 225, 11. Zvu
  6. ↑ Reinbold, p. 129, 9. Zvo
  7. ↑ Edition used, p. 237, 11. Zvu and p. 248, 2. Zvo
  8. ↑ Klotz in the afterword of the edition used, p. 345, 4th Zvu
  9. ↑ Edition used, p. 44, 20. Zvo
  10. ↑ Edition used, p. 103, 16. Zvu
  11. ↑ Stevenson, quoted in Reinbold, p. 130, 2nd Zvu
  12. ↑ Edition used, p. 237, 11. Zvu
  13. ↑ Edition used, p. 199, 7th Zvu
  14. ↑ Edition used, p. 234, 3rd Zvu
  15. ↑ Edition used, p. 332, 15. Zvo
  16. ↑ Dölvers, p. 137, 7. Zvo
  17. ↑ Reinbold, p. 129, 7. Zvo
  18. ↑ Reinbold, pp. 130,12. Zvu