Sire de Malétroit's door

Des Sire de Malétroit door ( English The Sire De Malétroit's Door ) is a short story by the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson , which appeared in March 1878 in the British literary magazine "Temple Bar".

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During the Hundred Years War : In September 1429, the 21-year-old cavalier Denis de Beaulieu from Bourges prowled the nightly Château-Landon . On the run from a detachment of drunken English mercenaries, Denis seeks rescue in the Malétroits townhouse. Strange - the sturdy door gives way. He enters the courtyard of the family, whom he does not know. The door snaps shut and cannot be opened again. Denis is trapped. The old Sire Alain de Malétroit was already expecting Denis and addressed him as “My dear nephew”. Denis protests against it with a burst of anger. He wants to smash the damned door to pieces with his sword. Messire de Malétroit doesn't have fun. The old nobleman leads his niece Blanche de Malétroit - an untouched flawless young lady - to the young newcomer. Blanche - horrified - assures her uncle that this is not her captain, Florimond de Champdivers. The old man unmoved regrets. He had tried in vain to track down the captain who had stained the honor of his house. Now God has sent the young nobleman from Bourges instead of the beau. Anyway, Sire Alain stays with the humorous "impromptu marriage" and gives the future couple two hours to get to know each other better.

A priest in a cassock is there, but Denis doesn't want to get married right away. Against the overwhelming power of the advancing squires of Sire Alain, he cannot compete. No, Denis doesn't want to. Then he just has to die, certainly his adversary. Blanche wants to be married under these circumstances. She assures Denis that he is the noblest man she would have ever met and asks: “Do you think I am beautiful?” Denis has to say yes, but does not want to be married out of pity. It goes back and forth. In between, Blanche returns the proud noblewoman. Denis laughs bitterly. The set two hours are over. The morning is dawning. Robert Louis Stevenson offers the reader a happy ending. Denis to Blanche: “I love you more than the whole world.” The old de Malétroit appears again. The Sire wishes the new nephew a good morning.

reception

• Wirzberger emphasizes the conflict of feelings in Denis and emphasizes Blanche's offensive in shaping her future. In this sense, two modern young people acted in medieval garb.
• The story was initially called The Sire De Malétroits Mousetrap . Realistic motivation is missing. Sire Alain stands “for evil as a timeless paradox”. Dölvers sees the emphasis on psychological processes as an organizing structural element.
• Reinbold takes the little story as one of Robert Louis Stevenson's attempts to “imagine one's way into the medieval world”.

Adaptations

Movie

• 1951 USA : Behind the Walls of Horror (The Strange Door) black and white film by Joseph Pevney with Charles Laughton as Sire Alain, Richard Wyler as Denis and Sally Forrest as Blanche.

broadcast

• August 4, 1947 on Escape : Les Crutchfield radio play with Elliott Lewis.
• 1951: The door of the Sire de Maletroit by Hans Rosenhauer with Joseph Offenbach .

German-language literature

expenditure

• The mysterious door and other scary stories. Three stories ( The mysterious door. The pavilion on the dunes. Markheim ). Transferred and edited by Liselotte Blechmann. Illustrations: Ernst Hermann Holthoff. Bastion Verlag Düsseldorf 1949. 182 pages.
• Quarters for the night . Want from the mill. Novellas. Insel Library No. 234 . Transferred from Irma and Albrecht Schaeffer (afterword), Insel-Verlag, Leipzig 1951. 80 pages
• Robert Louis Stevenson: The Sire de Malétroit's door . Pp. 3-29. (Translator: Curt Thesing ) in Robert Louis Stevenson: The Mysterious Life. Master tales. ( Des Sire de Malétroit's door. Markheim . Olalla . The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde . The crooked Janet . John Nicholson's unfortunate adventures . Will of the mill . The pavilion on the dunes ) Afterword by Karl-Heinz Wirzberger . Dieterich'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung , Leipzig 1953, 400 pages.
• The door of the Sire de Maletroit . The new adventure booklet 371. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1977

Secondary literature

• Horst Dölvers: The narrator Robert Louis Stevenson. Interpretations. Francke Verlag, Bern 1969, without ISBN (200 pages).
• Michael Reinbold: Robert Louis Stevenson. Rowohlt, Reinbek 1995, ISBN 3-499-50488-X .

Web links

in English

Wikisource: The Sire de Maletroit's Door  - Sources and full texts (English)

• Edition from 1882: online in the Internet Archive
• 1951 film adaptation: still pictures

Remarks

1. ↑ Alternative title writings in German transmissions: The door of Sire de Maletroit , The mysterious door .
2. ↑ Edition used.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ engl. Temple Bar
2. ↑ Reinbold p. 62, 9. Zvu and p. 64, 4. Zvo
3. ↑ Wirzberger in the afterword of the edition used, p. 386, 14th Zvu
4. ↑ Dölvers, p. 125, 7th Zvu
5. ↑ Dölvers, p. 127, 1. Zvu
6. ↑ Dölvers, p. 129, 15. Zvu
7. ↑ Reinbold, p. 64, 2. Zvo
8. ^ The Strange Door
9. ↑ engl. Sally Forrest
10. ↑ engl. Escape : Episode No. 5 (see also No. 7 (Escape 470804 005 Sire De Maltroits Door 128-44 29m32s 27699) in the Internet Archive: 30 minutes online)
11. ↑ engl. Elliott Lewis