The crooked Janet

The crooked Janet ( Engl. Thrawn Janet ) is a short story by the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson from 1881 to 1887 in the collection of the great men and other stories (Engl. The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables ) in Chatto & Windus appeared.

The author wrote the little ghost story during a stay in the Scottish Highlands . Critics call the text "one of his masterpieces".

shape

The story culminates on the night of August 17th, 1712.

The anonymous first-person narrator prefers the first person plural and thus reveals himself contextually as a resident of the heath village Balweary - that is the location of the action. Robert Louis Stevenson tries to persuade the reader that this narrator believes in witches and the black man. The latter is one of several devils in Scotland.

At the beginning the narrator introduces his protagonist, a clergyman, as an old devil-believing zealot. Yet the pastor had once come to Balweary as an enlightened, modern young man with his many books through his university studies. This story tells how the pastor came to believe in the devil.

content

The churchgoers from Balweary fear their pastor Murdoch Soulis, who has lived in the lonely parsonage on the banks of the Dule River for fifty years.

Once, when the gossip women from Balweary were dragging old hag Janet M'Clour down to the Dule bank, tearing her clothes off and trying to see whether the old witch was going under, the pastor had put a stop to the women’s activities and by virtue of his authority Saved Janet's life. From then on, Janet had run the bachelor household for her savior. When Janet had been hit, it was the angry pastor who had blamed the cruel people of Balwaery for Janet's sequelae - the twisted neck and crooked head.

Pastor Soulis goes to his favorite place, the old, long-abandoned cemetery below the Black Mountain. Seven ravens circling the orphaned churchyard herald the disaster. The black man appears to the pastor. The being in human form finally disappears in the parish. The pastor courageously walks behind. Janet denies encountering the black monster. The pastor is not comfortable with this and he would soon like to believe in what people are saying. Janet was long dead and the black man was walking around in her body.

On that August 17th, Mr. Soulis is disturbed by rumbling and trampling in Janet's room during his midnight studies. Undaunted, he follows the noises. Janet is dangling from a nail. The dead tongue hangs from the mouth. The pastor leaves Janet's room and closes the door behind him. An hour or two later, the crooked Janet's body stands in front of Mr. Soulis. Janet tries to speak, but only manages to make a sign with her left hand. The pastor yells that she should go to the grave or go to hell.

God helps. He strikes out of the night sky. The corpse loosens. Only a small pile of ash remains. Pastor Soulis has to stay in bed and talks crazy for a long time.

Self-testimony

“It was widely believed in Scotland that the devil appeared as a black man. This is shown by various witch trials. "

reception

• Robert Louis Stevenson has strengthened the homely atmosphere of his text by weaving in untranslatable Scottish dialect.
• Dölvers takes the story as an example of a narrative theory thesis of the author. Every detail serves to build the overall message.

German-language literature

expenditure

• The Adventures of John Nicholson and Other Tales. Translated into German by Marguerite and Curt Thesing . ( The Adventures of John Nicholson. The Isle of Voices . The Corpse Robber . Wanted from the Mill. The crooked Janet ). Buchenau & Reichert Verlag, Berlin around 1925. 248 pages
• The crooked Janet . Pp. 189-202. (Translator: Ilse Hecht) in Robert Louis Stevenson: The Enigmatic 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.
• RADIOROPA Audiobook Classic Edition - Manfred Callsen reads: Robert Louis Stevenson: Markheim. The crooked Janet. ISBN 978-3-8368-0424-0

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

Wikisource: Thrawn Janet  - Sources and full texts (English)

• The text at Classic Reader (English)

annotation

1. ↑ Edition used.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Reinbold, p. 153, 22. Zvo (see also Dölvers, p. 58, 1. Zvu)
2. ↑ engl. The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables
3. ↑ Wirzberger in the afterword of the edition used, p. 387, 14th Zvu
4. ↑ Dölvers, p. 59, 6. Zvo
5. ↑ Edition used, p. 198., 13. Zvu
6. ↑ Dölvers, p. 59, 10. Zvo
7. ^ Robert Louis Stevenson cited in Dölvers, p. 161, 4. Zvo
8. ↑ Wirzberger in the afterword of the edition used, p. 387, 13. Zvu (see also Dölvers, p. 61, 9. Zvo)
9. ↑ Dölvers, p. 58, 6th Zvu