The way through February

The way through February is the third novel by Anna Seghers , published in Paris in 1935.

The author paints a picture of the Austrian civil war , which claimed numerous lives in mid-February 1934. The Schutzbund , a paramilitary force of the Austrian Social Democratic Workers' Party , is subject to the Dollfuss government in the bitter struggle of the Heimwehr and the executive ( armed forces, police, gendarmerie) .

content

Few fates are picked out from the abundance of material. Anna Seghers writes in the preface that she changed the names of people and streets in the novel.

Kroytner dies in Vienna

The reader is introduced to the Schutzbündler Kroytner before the actual fighting in a Viennese apartment. The wife of another fighter has the social democratic doctor Dr. Image called to her husband's deathbed. The unfortunate man tore his hand to pieces - probably while making a bomb. He's bleeding to death. Dr. Bildt can't do anything. Kroytner, "a boy of twenty-five, bright and taut", appears in the apartment and tries to persuade the "Comrade Doctor" to falsify the death certificate. Nobody, not even the wife, should find out the cause of death. Because Kroytner bravely carried out a number of actions for the Schutzbund in 1933, he is to become the "substitute" for head Franz. His wife is proud of him. She knows that he is doing one “tricky party matter” after another and is calm. After Franz was arrested, Kroytner made the substitute without a decision from the party leadership. He calls on the Schutzbund to armed struggle. His wife is crying. She is delighted and frightened at the same time. When everything is lost, Kroytner can't stand it at home. He roams through Vienna in search of fellow combatants, reaches Floridsdorf , passes the winners' post without being disturbed and tries in vain to speak to a former combatant in his apartment. The campaigner is said to be on the run to " Czech Republic ". When Kroytner leaves, disappointed, and enters the alley, he cannot bear the laugh of a guard from the Home Guard. He pulls the pistol and shoots the laugh over the heap. Three other guards hit Kroytner's skull.

Hannes Johst from Steyr is strangled by the local Bastian Nuss

The unemployed Heimwehrler Nuss, father of four children, receives work from the Steyr cabinet maker Aloys Fischer. Johst and Nuss know each other. When the two of them happened to meet on the street - Johst was accompanied by other Social Democrats - the Schutzbundler Johst changed the subject, talking about private matters; tells of the pregnancy of his young wife Martha. When Nuß is out of earshot, the Linz liaison man Martin Ruppl is again spoken to in plain language. During the uprising, Johst, a member of the Schutzbund leadership, did not come home for nights. In battle, when the mortars howl, the comrades despair. In the face of death, they appear to have aged and with the lament: “We're bleeding to death”, calling on Johst to forward the order to withdraw. He should also think of their wives and children. Johst replies: “There are enough women and children in the world.” When the order to advance comes - Johst only thinks of advance - he is surprised; is dismayed that other fighters think of something other than the fight. Later, on the run, his fellow combatants force him to retreat. Johst didn't want to go on living. Now he has to see Martha. The pregnant woman was driven out of the apartment and beaten by the enemy. Nuß volunteers to strangle Johst in the prison cell with a hemp string for 200 shillings. Johst dies upright. When Nuss reports back to master carpenter Aloys Fischer to continue working after the Heimwehr victory, he is chased from the farm. The master says: “Look, Mr. Nuss, we just dread you.” On the way back, Nuss came up with a quick-witted answer too late: “Would you rather have staggered yourself?” Influential patrons convey Nuss work in a Linz chair factory. The Nuss family received an apartment in Linz and paid for their move well. She had moved from Vienna. Various aid organizations want to support Martha's impending confinement materially. Martha refuses. Her face has suddenly turned black and gray. When she does accept a small amount of aid from the Austrian Red Aid , a former fellow combatant of Johst's criticizes her that it was not necessary. The Social Democrats are still there. Anna Seghers describes the birth: “... you heard the screaming of the newborn child. It rang over their heads, over the night city. In his undisguised horror at the cold of the world, in his unbroken obsession with not wanting to rest until hunger is satisfied, he could not be compared with any other scream that man utters until the hour of his death. "

Rudolf Bäranger dies in Vienna

The 18-year-old Fritz Obrecht and the young Rudolf Bäranger, both of whom are socially-democratically organized in the Schutzbund in the Vienna W.-A.-Kabelwerke under the works council chairman Riedl, are inseparable friends. In the fight when it comes to dying, Fritz can not believe the death of his friend. Fritz and Rudolf's mother later look for the February graves in the crematorium cemetery. Neither the cemetery keeper nor the gardener want to know. A black-clad man with a stiff hat constantly pursues the two seekers. When the visitors found the name, Frau Bäranger hastily digs a potted plant and Franz pulls Rudolf's mother away.

The Graz communist Willaschek is imprisoned for twelve years

The 21-year-old former Social Democrat Willaschek has been sent on patrol by the Schutzbund with the young Social Democrat Martin Holzer, his father and the old Weber. Willaschek would like to fight, but ended up empty-handed when handing out weapons due to unreliability. When the four encounter a uniformed guard on the way, Willaschek snatches the rifle from old Weber and shoots the gunman. The shooter has luck in misfortune before the barriers of the victorious justice. He has not been charged with murder. Martin Holzer got away with one year, Weber with two and old Holzer with four years imprisonment.

Wallisch

In Graz, “Wallisch and his wife” also appear in the margins. Later, an anonymous mountain farmer couple, who live lonely above the Bruck Valley , once briefly spoke derogatory about the fighter. In the July 1934 issue of the " Neue Deutschen Blätter ", Anna Seghers published "The Last Path of Koloman Wallisch ", a story about the Schutzbund who was hanged in February 1934 . The author had hiked parts of Austria solo in the spring of 1934 and used Paula Wallisch's publication (see below) as a source.

Ten weeks after that February 19, 1934, on which Wallisch was executed in Leoben , Anna Seghers set off on a train trip from Graz to Bruck an der Mur, bought a map of Upper Styria and went on foot on the last route Wallischs. 5000 schillings had been placed on his head. The traitor had ordered a taxi driver to Oberaich on February 17th .

Quote

• "Today's defendants will be tomorrow's judges."

Form and interpretation

When following the alternately presented storylines from the centers of struggle - mainly in Linz , Graz, Steyr and Vienna - the reader can lose track. On the one hand, the mostly short sequences alternate quite often. On the other hand, the large number of minor characters introduced causes a certain disorientation.

With Anna Seghers, the KPÖ , which Dollfuss banned in 1933, fights illegally on the side of the Social Democrats. Usually it is not clear whether the fighter in question is a social democrat or a communist. There is only talk of “comrade”. Sometimes, however, the differentiation is possible through detailed detective work. For example, the young comrade Fritz mentioned above is a social democrat because he says: "I am not at all in favor of ... that we ... march over to the Communist Party as one."

The novel is politicized in excess. There is talk of “belief in the party”, of Stalin and Hitler . However, an incident is always interspersed; for example that of the Floridsdorf municipal council Wöllner. Suspected of being a Schutzbund member, he is taken out of bed in the morning and brought before the inspector with an arrest warrant. The "criminal" hits him on the mouth. Punches on the temples follow. Or Herbst, the director of the Steyrwerke , is shot from ambush while leaving the works. Despite the serious topic, Anna Seghers also offers a cheerful story. Schutzbündler simply set up a machine gun in Frau Kamptschik's highly polished living room in Sandleiten . The husband is absent. Only the toddler is still there. First of all, the housewife, who cares about cleanliness, wants to throw out the warriors and their ammunition boxes. After all, the woman entertains the men. The dying of the other side, that of a young police officer, is touched upon: “Why was he in pain? He no longer had a body. Why did he have thoughts? He didn't have time anymore. He died ... Why he of all ...? Why now ...? ... Why here ...? Why, for what and for whom? He tried to get hold of God, but he quickly evaporated with his own blood. "

reception

• The text is not ostensibly political, as it is with many other communist authors. Due to the material, the novel has a documentary character. The exaggerated use of “multi-stranded composition” hinders the overview. In addition to the experience of defeat, Anna Seghers articulates her hope for the victory of the proletarians in several places at the end of the novel. Apparently, the German author is not so much concerned with Austria as with the differences between the SPD and KPD . As always in her texts, Anna Seghers did not forget the intellectuals alongside the proletariat. Schrade refers to the conversation with Dr. Karlingers with Dr. Show up.
• 1975, Sigrid Bock: “Reality analysis and gain in realism. On Anna Seghers´ novel The Way Through February "

literature

Text output

First edition

• The way through February. Novel. Editions du Carrefour, Paris 1935. 295 pages, linen. Front part of the original cover with a photomontage by John Heartfield .

Used edition

• The way through February. Novel. P. 171-410 in: Anna Seghers: Der Kopflohn . The way through February. Volume II of the collected works in separate editions . 410 pages. Aufbau-Verlag GmbH, Berlin 1952

Secondary literature

• Paula Wallisch : A hero dies . Ed .: German Social Democratic Workers' Party in the Czechoslovak Republic, Karlsbad 1934, linen, 246 pages with photos
• 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
• The last way of Koloman Wallisch . P. 191-207 and P. 365, 2nd entry from the top 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
• 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

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hilzinger, p. 204, 6. Zvo
2. ↑ Edition used, p. 173
3. ↑ Edition used, p. 257, 19. Zvo
4. ↑ Edition used, p. 355, 2nd Zvu
5. ↑ Edition used, p. 356, 17th Zvu
6. ↑ Edition used, p. 377, 1. Zvu
7. ↑ Edition used, p. 206, 1. Zvo ( Kabelwerk Wien-Meidling )
8. ↑ see under "secondary literature": Seghers 1981
9. ↑ Schrade, p. 43, 7. Zvu and Neugebauer, p. 49, 10. Zvo
10. ↑ Hilzinger, p. 170, 1st Zvu
11. ↑ Edition used, p. 407, 4th Zvu
12. ↑ Edition used, p. 380, 9. Zvu
13. ↑ Edition used, p. 235, subsection 5
14. ↑ Edition used, p. 241, 1. Zvo
15. ↑ Edition used, p. 333 below
16. ^ Schrade, p. 45, 2nd Zvu
17. ↑ Neugebauer, p. 50, 10. Zvu and Schrade, p. 44, 6. Zvo
18. ^ Batt, p. 96
19. ↑ Brandes, p. 43, 17. Zvo
20. ^ Schrade, p. 46, 13. Zvo
21. ↑ Schrade, p. 44, 4th Zvu
22. ↑ Edition used p. 188, 16. Zvu to p. 193, 3. Zvo and p. 391, 13. Zvu
23. ↑ quoted in Hilzinger, p. 214, last entry