Three human questions
Three human questions : Who are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going? was the name of the lecture that Karl May gave on October 18, 1908 in Lawrence's crowded gym. The event was organized by Ferdinand Pfefferkorn, Herman Grunwald and the German-American National Association.
The presentation
The lecture itself has been handed down in fragments from reviews in the local press:
- “The lecture was preceded by the mass choir song of the German choirs under the direction of Mr. Emil Wilde 'This is the day of the Lord', the choir also sang a song during the break between the two parts of the lecture. Councilman Hermann Grunwald acted as chairman and introduced speakers in appropriate words. "
In the name of Germanness, May receives a golden gymnastics pin from Chairman Grunwald after the lecture.
On October 19, 1908, a report appeared in the Evening Tribune . Articles based on May's contribution also appeared in the Saturday editions of the two German newspapers, the Deutscher Herold and Anzeiger and Post .
Content of the "question of humanity"
The question of humanity is manifested, according to Karl May in the first-person narrator of his works and in his person. Karl May writes in an aphorism: The question of humanity
- “Is the me. She's Old Shatterhand in America and she's Kara Ben Nemsi Effendi in the Orient . She is the reverse pseudonym of Karl May, because she is the actual author of the travel stories, but the pseudonym is he ... "
The human question itself is the question that God put to Adam when he hid from him after the fall : "Man, where are you?"
- “What is the human question? It was created by God when he created man. He lived in the paradise of Jinnistan. The fruits of the marshland were forbidden to him. He went down anyway to enjoy it. No sooner had he done that than he saw that he was naked, stripped of all nobility, all majesty, all purity, all dignity. There was nothing about him that was eternal; he had earned himself death.
- He hid himself. Then the Lord came and called: 'Adam, where are you?' Adam means man. What is meant is nobleman. So: 'Man, nobleman, where are you?'
- At that moment the human question was born. She left paradise with Adam .
- God was gracious on him, who now lived in Ardistan and therefore had to die. He gave him the gift of his offspring, in which he was allowed to live on, in order to return to Jinnistan, to paradise, after thousands of years of continued purification.
- Wherever people turned, the question of humanity went with them. She stood on every battlefield on earth to exclaim:
- 'Adam where are you? Where is the noble humanity? I do not see her.'
- She raised her voice whenever and wherever people sinned against people. It seemed to be eternal because human suffering does not seem to end. And it seemed to be omnipresent, because human woes are omnipresent. "
Karl May gives a similar explanation in his letter to Princess Wiltrud of Bavaria (March 7, 1908): The author has become the host of the human question, which roamed for millennia and laments the increasing moral corruption of humanity, until it is now again by Karl May has found a mouthpiece. So man should be led back to God.
In the aphorisms about Karl May he pursues this thesis on several pages.
Others
After Hans Wollschläger , Karl May wrote Paul Gauguin's painting Where Are We From? Who are we? Where are we going? , created in 1897/98 during his last stay in Tahiti and later in the possession of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston , seen shortly before his lecture. However, the museum did not acquire the painting until 1936.
Remarks
- ↑ http://www.karl-may-wiki.de/index.php/Ferdinand_Pfefferkorn
- ↑ Report by the German Herald of October 19, 1908.
- ↑ Karl May: Up into the realm of noble men
- ↑ Jb-KMG 1983, pp. 107-111; Between Heaven and Hell , pp. 316-318.
- ↑ http://www.karl-may-wiki.de/index.php/Aphorismen_über_Karl_May
- ↑ "'Three questions about humanity' - did you know, by the way, that the old man saw the Gauguin picture before the lecture in Boston?" Hans Wollschläger in conversation with Rudi Schweikert in: RS (Ed.): Hans Wollschläger . Eggingen 1995, p. 255 (quoted from KMG-Nachrichten No. 117).
- ^ Dieter Sudhoff : Karl May in Amerika , p. 348
literature
- Karl May: Aphorisms about Karl May . Including in the yearbook of the Karl May Society 1983 ( online version ) and in Von Ehefrauen und Ehrenmännern .
- Gerhard Neumann: The I wrote. Considerations about the hero in Karl Mays' novel . In: Yearbook of the Karl May Society 1987 ( online version )
- Hermann Wohlgschaft : Great Karl May biography. Leben und Werk , 1994. (especially chapter The 'Human Question': Visions and Dreams - Deception or Truth? )