The assistant

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Robert Walser
Robert Walser - The Assistant, paperback cover of the first edition

Der Gehülfe is a novel by Robert Walser , written in Berlin in 1907 and published there in May 1908 by Bruno Cassirers .

The 24-year-old Joseph Marti, assistant to the engineer Carl Tobler, experienced the ruin of the family of an unsuccessful inventor for six months as a domestic worker and went his own way.

Truth and poetry

Walser lets the assistants in a village Bärenswil , a good three-quarters of an hour train ride from the large canton capital away , occur. That place of action, the Villa zum Abendstern , is in Wädenswil on Lake Zurich . This emerges from a letter from Robert Walser of December 14, 1920 to Curt Wüest. A facsimile of the letter is in Mächler between pages 112 and 113. It shows the tower in which the assistant was housed. The property was occupied by the machine technician Carl Dubler , his wife Frieda and their four children. The children's first names were taken over into the text of the novel as well as the inventions of the technician - the advertising clock, the vending machine for rifle ammunition and the hospital chair. Walser lived in the house for four months as an employee of Dublers and left it for the New Year in 1904 before the unsuccessful entrepreneur went bankrupt .

As a girl, Walser's mother Elisa had the same family name as the protagonist: Marti.

Joseph Marti

Villa to the evening star

It tells the story of the slow decline of the Tobler house . Joseph Marti has been unemployed for some time. He applied to the inventor Tobler as an assistant and got the job after a trial day. He can live in his employer's villa; in summer he moves into a tower room and stays there for six months until the new year. Joseph also dines at the family table. There is no other way. Initially, he doesn't get his salary. He has to live on handouts that the boss sporadically slips him. Although Joseph actually with Schuldenabzahlen rush would, he agrees. Despite more and more escalating financial situation the family does not live badly. Nobody has to go hungry. On the contrary - the landlord Carl (also: Karl) Tobler invites citizens from the village to summer garden parties on his lake property in the midst of the charming mountain landscape. The August 1st is celebrated on Tobler's lush estate illuminated with fireworks omitted.

If possible, Joseph enjoys the summer; swims, at night Frau Tobler and the four children row across the lake. Music sounds, embraces the dark, fragrant body of the sea summer night silence .

The invention

Joseph's work, the Bureau of the technical inventor Tobler, located in the basement of the villa. Tobler invented: the advertising clock , the deep hole drilling machine , the automatic gunner that issues a package of cartridges after inserting a coin , the patented hospital chair and a small steam apparatus, this steam container . In addition, a power plant creator speaks at the office for the self- power generation machine in cities . Ultimately, nobody wants to buy Tobler's inventions on licensing. When Ms. Tobler fell ill and the engineer tried out his hospital chair on his own wife, he had to take criticism. The very pretty little model is uncomfortable. The inventor quickly redesigns.

The inventor

Tobler wants a head as an employee . Thinking about great things is not Joseph's business. The new assistant shines in the fulfillment of secondary tasks . None of this is mental work, but without exception henchman activity. The summer garden around the villa can be watered with a hose. Errands, also for Tobler's wife, have to be done. The housekeeper Pauline has to be given a hand every now and then. Joseph plays the role of a caretaker.

Tobler particularly demands punctuality from Joseph. If the Gehülfe in the Bureau a little late, there is a thunderstorm. Joseph is deliberately silent on such an occasion . Tobler complains about Bärenswil, the dirt nest, and really means its inhabitants, who smell the inventor's unsuccessfulness and withdraw in an orderly manner.

While working, Joseph von Tobler is allowed to smoke cigar butts. Three years ago, the boss had been a simple assistant engineer in a large machine factory, had inherited, but put his money into buying the villa and the advertising clock. Therefore, money has to be found as soon as possible. A capitalist , if possible a factory owner , should be won as a financier so that the mass production of the patented inventions can begin immediately . Nothing comes of this in the whole novel. Rather, Tobler has to invent reasons for refusal to pay . Even in autumn there is no change in the way of things , although Tobler never tires of finding the capitalist on frequent business trips . When a capitalist actually visits the villa, Tobler has just gone away. Joseph has to step in and drive away the potential financier with his irresponsible, mindless behavior. Tobler rages on his return from the trip, but can forgive. He gives the assistant some of his worn clothes. The offended Joseph insists verbally, but eventually takes the gifts of clothing . When Tobler abuses his wife, Joseph can't help it - he steps in and admonishes the engineer. The inventor, never embarrassed, tells the employee to have a big mouth , anyone can do that. He should finally do something. In view of the increasing number of unpaid bills of exchange , Tobler is combative: an idea dies or it wins . He already pumps friends and relatives on his travels. After all, Tobler has to admit his illiquidity on debt claims . But he still has a maternal inheritance . But the amount that the mother gives is only a drop in the ocean; can only appease the fiercest creditors and debtors a little. In order to get the benefit of the mother's money, Tobler even has to send his wife in front. Not even the manager of the capital's Employment Bureau is the small agency fee paid. The electricity company turns off the electricity for the villa.

Mrs. Tobler

Frau Tobler comes from a real bourgeois background and is not in the least afraid of her husband. Since the latter is often on the road, she inevitably passes the time with the assistant . They both have fun , talk or Joseph simply watches Frau Tobler as she reads. Once he sees the woman in her negligee through her open bedroom door . In no way does a relationship develop between the two, but they grow closer. You respect yourself. Frau Tobler confides in the assistant . She knows who she is and does not let the courage to face life sink. The cause of the professional failure of her husband is, in her opinion, the lavish benefits , which those fellow men who now press him hard have enjoyed. Frau Tobler stands by her husband, but in the end she can only postpone the ruin a little. Sometimes she asks Joseph whether the disaster could still be averted. As Joseph, who always wants to comfort the woman, considers this to be entirely possible, she calls him a liar. How true! But Joseph feels the increasing hostility in the daily fending off the believers on his own body. On the Bärenswiler Bank , astonishment turns into condescending pity .

We'll be visiting

Wirsich, Joseph's predecessor as house servant, had been chased out of the house by Tobler for making rude appearances caused by being completely drunk . Now the drinker, who dragged his old mother into the villa as reinforcement, is asking to be reinstated. The engineer sees himself incapable. Joseph does his job well too . Then in late autumn, the summer lake has become a lake of mist , we come out of the rain and the cold . Joseph takes the homeless man up in his tower room - with the consent of Frau Tobler (the landlord is traveling) - shares the bed with him and forces the drunkard on a piece of gold that Tobler gave him the day before. The Tobler, this Großhans wishes Wirsich that he made flies out his boastful house and garden .

Dora, Silvi, Edi, Walter and Pauline

The evening star is still inhabited by the Toblers' four children - the girls Dora and Silvi and the boys Edi and Walter. Ms. Tobler cannot explain it to herself, she hates Silvi, her own child. The maid Pauline has permission from the landlady to beat the toddler at night when it gets wet in bed . Pauline uses her power. Joseph observes the nagging and finally reproaches Mrs. Tobler seriously. In washing the Gehülfe reads the same yet the just returning Tobler the Levites : The woman abused Silvi and the father ignores it. Tobler's statement is: The woman is a goose and Joseph is crazy .

Joseph goes on

When Wirs lost his next job in Bärenswil again due to drunkenness, Joseph is also preparing to leave the villa for the evening star . He is applying for a suitable position at the city's employment agency . After another clumsiness on the part of Joseph, the Lord and Master becomes active . Weeping, Frau Tobler's assistant explains his intended departure. The wife remains cold and recommends that the employee say goodbye to her husband. The assistant is thrown out of the house by the engineer. Joseph and Wirsich leave Bärenswil and move on .

Self-testimony

  • Robert Walser on Carl Seelig : 'Der Gehülfe' is a completely realistic novel. I hardly had to invent anything. Life did that for me .

reception

  • In 1936, Hesse wrote that although the assistant was full of moods from the beginning of the 20th century , the story was enchanting with the timeless grace of its presentation and the delicate and unintentional play of magic .
  • According to Zollinger , Walser's indescribable magic can be traced back to his pedantic incorruptibility .
  • In 1983 Anne Gabrisch wrote that master and servant were equally foolish - a pair of terrible comedy. And reminiscent of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza from afar .
  • Mächler tells the story of how the assistant came about. The novel waswritten in six weeks as part of a Scherl- Verlagcompetition. Walser asked for a fee of eight thousand marks , but received the manuscript back by return post because of the high demand. When Walser quarreled with the publishing director, the author is said to have escaped: You Kamel don't understand anything about literature .
  • Sprengel sums up, the Bärenswiler turn out to be the successor to the people of Seldwyla .

shape

The reader cannot get rid of an oppressive feeling. The bankruptcy of Tobler's getting closer with each flip. Fortunately, this poet Walser has two counterweights for that oppression up his sleeve. The first is the description of the Don quixote , which even Gabrisch (see above) could not overlook. How Tobler treats his assistant and vice versa increasingly stimulates the reader's laugh muscles . But the laughter gets stuck in the throat. The second is the light that still flashes everywhere , the impressive depiction of nature and, last but not least, Joseph's humanity . This is not only expressed in empathy , i.e. active compassion, but especially in the moral courage of intervening in favor of the abused.

words and phrases

Like all of Walser's work, the 'assistant' is not free from gimmicks .

  • Joseph dreams: The living room was trembling . The office was pungent green with glee .
  • Tobler insults the villagers who are not easily ripped off : Your cunts! [Rags (guys)].
  • Häfchen - Helvetism for: chamber pot .
  • ashamed Räf - probably: a nagging woman.
  • The same train runs away from Tobler's nose.
  • fountain-rushing angles .
  • The sounds seem to echo, thunder and embrace everything .
  • Dutch drunkard scene painter .
  • mentally contract [become lazy] and wilt .

literature

  • Used edition
    • Robert Walser: The assistant. Novel . Edited by Jochen Greven. With an afterword by the editor. Zurich 1985. ISBN 3-518-37610-1
  • First edition
    • Robert Walser: The assistant. Roman , published by Bruno Cassirer, Berlin 1908. 2 sheets, 392 p., 6 sheets advertisements. Original brochure with colored cover illustration by Karl Walser .
  • Secondary literature
Image of the shooting

filming

The assistant was filmed in 1975 by Thomas Koerfer with Paul Burian as Joseph Marti, Ingold Wildenauer as Carl Tobler and Verena Buss as Frau Tobler.

Audio book

In 2015 an abridged staged reading with Martin Hofer and Heinz Müller was published by LOhrBär-Verlag, Regensburg, ISBN 978-3-939529-14-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Edition used, epilogue, pp. 299f.
  2. ↑ Mächler , p. 16
  3. ↑ Edition used, p. 300
  4. ↑ Michels , p. 461
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 305
  6. ↑ Edition used, p. 307
  7. ↑ Mächler, p. 81f
  8. ↑ a b c Hesse , quoted in Michels , p. 462
  9. ↑ Edition used, pp. 56 and 58
  10. ↑ Edition used, pp. 158 and 67
  11. ↑ Edition used, p. 112
  12. ↑ Edition used, p. 119
  13. ↑ Edition used, p. 153
  14. ↑ a b Edition used, p. 212
  15. ↑ Edition used, p. 260
  16. ↑ Edition used, p. 277