Esterka Regina
Esterka Regina is a novella by the Austrian writer Karl Emil Franzos , written in 1872 and published in 1876 in the collection Die Juden von Barnow at Duncker & Humblot in Leipzig . .
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In the Podolian town of Barnow and in Vienna at the beginning of the second half of the 19th century: the poet Thaddäus Wiliszewski invented the name Esterka Regina - in German Queen Esther - for the beautiful Rachel Welt, a poor shy girl from Barnower Judengasse. When choosing the name, the imaginative Pole had thought of both the biblical Esther and the illegitimate concubine Kasimir the Great .
Rachel was sold by her father, the butcher Hirsch Welt, "one of the most pious pious in the community", to the blond Hasidic Barnow ox dealer Chaim Pinkus. After a couple of years of marriage, Rachel Pinkus died of a "broken heart". Before her death, the young woman gave a letter to her lover, the medical officer Dr. Adolf Leiblinger in Dutch service to Batavia .
The son of the Barnow city doctor (alias Franzos), a student in Vienna, actually tells the story of the unhappy love of his friend Aaron (German: Adolf) Leiblinger.
Hirsch Welt had given Aaron's mother, the widow Chane Leiblinger, a little room in his house out of mercy. Rachel and Aaron spent their childhood under one roof and loved one another. As a Jew, Aaron graduated from Barnow Monastery School with the narrator and then studied medicine in Vienna.
Eleven years have passed since those children's games in Rachel's father's house. The two friends Aaron and the narrator visit Barnow during the summer vacation. During Aaron's several encounters with Rachel, the couple experienced their first love. Both realize that they are meant for each other. Rachel swears allegiance to Aaron. After a good year, the two friends have long been studying in Vienna again, Rachel writes to Aaron that she did not love him. It was just friendship. Rachel, having become sensible, obeys her father and becomes Mrs. Pinkus.
Four years later, Aaron returns to Vienna from a two-year stay in Batavia. Rachel died four weeks earlier. Aaron is carrying Rachel's suicide note mentioned above. It says in her letter, four years ago, that she lied. Because Rachel always loved Aaron and will love him forever.
expenditure
- Esterka Regina , pp. 169-213 in: The Jews of Barnow. Stories from Karl Emil Franzos . 11-15 Edition. Cotta'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Stuttgart 1920 ( archive.org ).
- Esterka Regina . P. 97-139 in: Karl Emil Franzos: The child of atonement. Stories. Illustrations by Gerhard Großmann . With an afterword by Wolfgang Schütze. Buchverlag Der Morgen, Berlin 1965 (2nd edition, edition used)
In English
- Esterka Regina , pp. 173-235 (translator MW Macdowall) in: The Jews of Barnow . William Blackwood and sons, Edinburgh 1882 ( archive.org ).
Web links
- Esterka Regina online at Zeno.org
- Esterka Regina online at Gutenberg-DE