Doctor Trojan

Doctor Trojan is a novella by Ferdinand von Saar from 1896 .

content

The frame narrator is a writer who stays as a guest at a castle near Brno to write there. In the village he met "Doctor" Trojan, a healer who was only just beginning his medical degree because he could not see any blood or cuts in human flesh. Nevertheless, he takes care of the local population. He gets along well with the doctor at the castle and consults them in difficult cases. During a walk, there is a long conversation between the narrator and Trojan. He explains his preference for nature and his aversion to city doctors.

Almost eight years later, the narrator visits the village again, where a lot has changed since then. The place has grown, the streets have been widened, new shops, a pharmacy and a doctor have settled. The narrator asks the castle doctor Hulesch about Trojan. The doctor reports on his further life and death.

The continuation of the content is represented by an internal narrative :

Trojan and the new village doctor become envious competitors. Trojan is prohibited from carrying out its activities by a court. Because of the new pharmacy, he can no longer sell his medication and is in ever greater distress. Eventually he moves to a nearby village and lives there with the beautiful day laborer Anuschka, who has been abandoned by her husband, and her son Honzicek. One night, Trojan suddenly appears at Doctor Hulesch's and asks him to come home. But it is too late. His partner dies of the consequences of an ulcer that should have been surgically removed. The next morning, Trojan is found dead next to his lover; he had almost severed his head with an old scythe . Anuschka's son later became a coachman at the castle.