The jungle residence
The Dsungel Residence (also "The Jungle Residence ", original title The Outstation ) is a short story by William Somerset Maugham . It appeared in International Magazine in June 1924 , and finally in book form in The Casuarina Tree collection (1926).
Emergence
Although Somerset Maugham is famous for his short stories in the Malay setting, he did not spend too much time in the countryside. He visited the then British colony of the Federated Malay States for the first time in 1921 . His stay lasted six months, three of them in a sanatorium on Java due to illness . His second and last visit was in 1925 when he was there for four months. However, this was enough to collect the material he was looking for. On his travels through remote jungle areas, he stayed overnight in the houses of colonial officials who had not seen a compatriot for months and were accordingly bursting with chats and stories. In the capital, Kuala Lumpur , he talked to people in clubs, carefully saving the gossip, stories, anecdotes and memories they were only too happy to pass on. Unlike certain other Malay stories, The Outstation cannot be directly traced back to a real person or place, although it likely had its germ in something Maugham was told about a hospitable gin-pahit. It vividly illustrates his main interest in examining the reactions of his compatriots in an exotic context. The Outstation first appeared in The Casuarina Tree collection (1926), along with the stories Before the Party, P. and O., The Force of Circumstance, The Yellow Streak and The Letter .
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The story is about a Mr. Warburton who lives in a remote colonial administration outpost in Borneo , who always dresses for dinner at a set time and is served by immaculately dressed Malay servants. He reads through the Times, especially the Lords and Ladies' social messages, even though they are always six weeks late. He has disciplined himself to read each issue in strict order, even if he would have liked to know the course of certain events. When he is on duty his clothes are invariably perfect, believing that if a man succumbs to the influences around him and loses his self-respect, he will also lose the respect of the natives. Warburton is the complete snob . However, over the years he has become a skilled administrator and has acquired a profound knowledge of and deep affection for the Malays, their customs and language, although he remains an English gentleman who will never become "native".
Eventually, an assistant is sent out to help with the extra work that has developed. The assistant, a shabby, dull man named Cooper, is all Warburton is not, and he is at first amused by the man's manners; Cooper, who is from the colonies, never went to a public school or university. "I wonder why on earth you sent me a guy like that?" Warburton thinks to himself, especially when he learns that his assistant, an inferior colonialist, bullies and treats Malaysians harshly. In return, Cooper earned her dislike. Gradually the irritation between the two men intensified; the situation escalates when, in Warburton's absence, Cooper rips open his sacrosanct copies of The Times, daring to read them first and leave them in a messy state. Then Warburton has compelling reasons to contradict one of Cooper's orders to his men. Their mutual contradiction erupts into a violent altercation when Cooper openly accuses him of being a snob and humiliates him by stating that he is a standing joke among his peers across the country.
- “ You didn't like me from the start. From day one. Because I didn't crawl before you, you did everything to make my position here unbearable. You put stones in my way wherever you could - because I am not swarming around you. "
- “ You are wrong. I thought you were a proletarian, but I was perfectly satisfied with the work you did. "
- “ You snob! You damn gentleman! They think I'm a proletarian because I haven't been to Eton. Ha, I was told in Kuala Solor what to expect. Yes, don't you know that you are the subject of laughter all over the country? [...] I'd rather be the proletarian you think I am than a snob like you. "
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Cooper dismisses his Malay servant after withholding his wages, wronging and insulting him. Well acquainted with the passionate and vengeful mentality of the Malays, Warburton warns him not to take serious risks. Cooper despises him, but a few days later he is found dead in his bed, a dagger through his heart. Warburton sits down happily again for his formal dinner, in full evening attire and enthusiastic reading of the social columns in the Times.
reception
James Harding wrote that one of Maugham's great strengths was that he did not take sides but interpreted the facts with obvious objectivity to round off his characters. Warburton is an outrageous snob, but he's also a fair administrator, respected by the Malaysians, whom he instinctively understands and whom he would like to be buried with when he dies. Cooper, on the other hand, is portrayed by Maugham as a racist type, "tactless and impolite, but within his limits he is conscientious and hardworking and grimly determined to get the best out of those he is supposed to supervise." The local color is cleverly touched, according to the author “To highlight the encounter between two types of men who, because of their different social classes, would never have met in England, while in Malaya their close opposition emphasizes the irreconcilable gulf that divides them.” Maugham's eye for the dramatic impact the narrative gives a force that drives history to its inevitable end. The Outstation , which the contemporary critic Edwin Muir described as "one of the best stories of our time", is still a prime example of Maugham's talent for tight structures. Here, as in the other stories in the volume, he builds up an intricate mosaic by collecting important details that only a master can distinguish and apply.
Maugham's rightly highly esteemed story “The Jungle Residence”, for example, addresses nothing less than social upheavals in global space, wrote Eberhard Falcke for Deutschlandfunk Kultur . In the narrowest field of action, social class conflicts intersect with the vulgar racism of colonialist oppression.
The greatest horror of the Somerset Maugham stories is "the time", wrote the literary critic Volker Weidermann ( Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung ). “Eternity is out there in the world. Nothing is moving. Nothing changes. [...] The snobbish governor in his jungle residence, to whom the central government has assigned a neglected and, over time, genuinely hated deputy, consoles himself with the prospect that he will not have to see him on vacation. The next vacation is in three years. Everything seems to last forever. That makes reading so leisurely and, despite all the drama, calming. Time is calm and horror. "
expenditure
- The outstation . In: The Casuarina Tree - Six Stories . London: Heinemann, 1926
- The outpost . Translated into German by Willy Burger . Typescript of a private translation from 1956
- The Jungle Residence in: Collected Stories IV. The Dragon - Winter Cruise, The Jungle Residence and other stories. Acc .: Tine and Gerd Haffmans . Zurich: Diogenes, 1972
- The jungle residence stories, translated by Ilse Krämer u. a. Berlin: Eulenspiegel Verlag Berlin, 1979
- East and West. The rest of the world. Collected stories in two volumes. Diogenes Verlag, Zurich 2005.
- Rain and other master tales . Read by Marietta Bürger, Hans Korte, Friedhelm Ptok and Werner Rehm. Diogenes audio book, Zurich 2005.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Unpredictable Human Nature - W.Somerset Maugham: "East and West" and "Rain and Other Master Tales". Deutschlandfunk, December 18, 2005, accessed on November 10, 2019 .
- ↑ The fear of missing out on life. FAZ.net, December 27, 2019, accessed on November 10, 2019 (English).