Jenny (novel)

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Fanny Lewald

Jenny is a novel by Fanny Lewald , first published in 1843 by Brockhaus-Verlag in Leipzig. It is considered to be one of the most important and earliest “ women's novels ” of the 19th century in German, comparable to the works of the Brontë sisters in England , which were created at the same time . The work was important for both women and the emancipation of Jews in Europe, as it was the first time that a woman was relatively open to calling for social and political upheaval through literature. In addition, Lewald directly compared the emancipation of women with the emancipation of Jews.

action

The title heroine of the novel, Jenny Meier, bears strongly autobiographical traits of the author. She comes from a wealthy Jewish merchant family in northern Germany, arguing in the face anti-Semitism and patriarchal social structures of the need for empowerment of women and Jewish women and Jews . At the beginning of the novel, which is set in 1832, she loves Reinhardt, a theological candidate who takes quite orthodox views. She converts to Christianity and is baptized, although for reasons of reason she cannot believe in various Christian dogmas. Shortly before the wedding, she wrote a letter to her fiancé confessing her religious doubts. He then breaks the connection.

The next chapter takes place eight years later. Jenny has resigned herself to not getting married. But she finds a new love in the person of the enlightened, understanding and liberal Count Walter. This disregards all class and religious prejudices. Both get engaged, but only a few days later he is killed in a duel when he tries to punish the abuse of his impending marriage to a "Jewish girl". Jenny dies of a broken heart in shock.

In a parallel plot, Lewald describes the fate of Jenny's brother, Eduard Meier, a doctor who is generally respected because of his expertise and personality. He loves Clara Horn, the daughter of a wealthy Christian banker, and is also loved by her, while she has sisterly love to her English cousin William Hughes, who also desires her. Due to the law, however, the Jewish doctor is not allowed to become a university teacher or take up a professorship; and mixed marriage between Jews and Christians is also forbidden. Although Edward's love is sustained, he cannot make up his mind to convert , since he considers it his highest duty to fight for the political and social emancipation of the Jews. Clara Horn eventually marries her cousin as an acceptable husband and thus becomes the standard wife with no personality or hope of her own.

style

Lewald also shows in her novel the casualness of anti-Semitic formulation, such as B. through pseudo-liberal observational admissions: "She is obviously a Jew, but it is a very interesting face". But she also relentlessly reproduces amateur racial phrases of the time. In a discussion that emerged among guests at a Silverster evening after a performance of the painting The Mourning Jews in Exile as a tableau vivant , it says: “It is with the Jews as with the royal houses or the high nobility, who also recruit themselves among themselves. The race degenerates into crippling or it ennobles ". Jenny's brother, Eduard Meier, admits that Jews generally lack moral courage: “For centuries, slavery has been upon us and the people feel so happy that they enjoy peace and quiet and are resigned instead of serious to demand the rights that are withheld from us ”. Fanny Lewald's achievement also lies in the fact that, in the dialogue between her characters in the novel, she advocates the Jewish emancipation in the Prussian Vormärz , which has remained incomplete since the Prussian reforms . In her dialogues, she even goes beyond this in places by having outsiders formulate a downright Zionist vision. One Englishman explains in her novel that one cannot deny that there are many abilities and talents among the Jews and continues: “I am amazed that these do not unite through the whole earth, that they do not offer all their abilities in order to achieve the goal of equality ”.

Some of their dialogues are also interesting against the background that other German poets anonymously chose very similar formulations with analogies to sleep and rest in order to demand political upheaval. Compare, for example, two stanzas from Georg Herwegh's lullaby , which was also published in 1843:

Georg Herwegh, 1847

"Germany - on what puddles
don't worry your head! Sleep in the
earthly turmoil
, what more do you want?

Let your freedom be robbed,
do not defend yourself,
you keep the Christian faith.
Sleep, what more do you want?

Lewald consciously chose different images in the metaphor of her novel than in the traditional German literature of her era. From Jenny's point of view, the figure of Count Walter is recommended as a husband because he rejects the very common symbol of the male tree and female ivy from his perspective : “You don't believe (...) how tired I am of these eternal oaks that hugs the ivy tenderly, the elms on which the vine climbs trustingly ”. On the other hand, Walter believes that quite a few wives of his time live a downright deplorable plant life because they could neither hold back nor keep up with aspiring men. Hence, poets should not invoke the imbalance of the married couple in such images. In a meaningful way, he looks at the picture of two strong trees that Jenny has drawn with joy, the branches of which are closely intertwined.

background

In retrospect, Fanny Lewald herself described the writing of her first two novels, Clementine and Jenny, as relatively easy: “The work here was entirely subjective in so far as I (...) had myself in a certain way as a model of my nature - and also for the others I had models of figures, some of which were only used to the extent that I kept what was typical of them ”.

After writing her third novel, Eine Lebensfrage ( A Question of Life) (1845), in which she discussed divorce, she developed a lively travel activity as a compensation for the strict isolation of her strict Jewish parents, which was what made the commercial success of her first three novels possible in the first place.

review

Jenny was received very positively by contemporaries , although they were aware of its political and literary importance: the book takes up “a deeper, almost historical interest. Emerging from the pressure of its own, difficult Jewish circumstances, it treats the questions of the emancipation of the Jews, the transfer, the social inhibition of the simplest conditions of happiness with great dignity ”.

The royal Saxon court advisor and librarian King Friedrich August II of Saxony , Johann Georg Theodor Grasse , classified Fanny Lewald's merits in his contemporary literary history in 1858 on the basis of her first novels as follows: “Admittedly, she had“ not without some abstract idealization, relations of the real world tried to paint with a skillful hand (...) ”.

Adolf Stahr, by Wilhelm Steinhäuser (1845)

In the state and society encyclopedia of Hermann Wagener , Fanny Lewald's biography was mentioned in 1865 in the context of that of her husband Adolf Stahr . However, the editors rate her talent higher because she “surpassed him in terms of clarity of conception as well as sharpness of originality”. In addition to the bright and dark sides of her novels, she was certified as having a "recognizable talent of storytelling".

Franz JL Thimm, however, in his English-language German literary history in 1866 wrongly reduced Lewald's merits in her first two novels to the fact that in them she merely described unhappy relationships. This is in clear contrast to today's reception in the Anglo-American region, which expressly appreciate the novel and Lewald.

In contemporary French-speaking countries, the psychological finesse in the development of the characters and Fanny Lewald's style in Jenny were praised . In the Netherlands of that time, the novel and its author were also praised.

The Allgemeine Zeitung des Judenthums still knew how to appreciate the merits of the novel and its author more than twenty years after the book's publication: “The author of 'Jenny' converted to Christianity in her early youth, but in this novel (...) highest respect for the moral purity of Jewish family life and a noble anger against all narrow-minded or worthless hostility of Judaism displayed ". Even from the perspective of 1879, Jenny was a veritable bestseller by the standards of the time and removed a number of prejudices against the Jews in Germany.

reception

The important secondary figure of Eduard Meier , Jenny's brother, also appears in Lewald's novel Der Third Stand (1846), where the Jewish, liberal doctor ultimately becomes the “real bearer of revolutionary sentiments”, which was already quite clear in Jenny .

The author herself was very proud of the enlightening effect of her novel and almost two decades later reported in detail in one of her biographical accounts of a conversation with a travel acquaintance who thanked her profusely for reading the novel Jenny with a view to Her eyes were opened to her previously latent resentment towards the Jews.

Anton Graff : Henriette Herz , 1792

Lewald's literary activity was interpreted in her early works as an opportunity for self-liberation: “Unlike Louise Aston , Fanny Lewald took this step into public awareness that she was a writer and woman, both inseparable and fully responsible for the literary text completed ". Lewald always reacted to condescending appreciation in the sense that it was well written for a woman, always offended. After having published Clementine anonymously and Jenny under the authorship of "by the author of Clementine" she was quite amused that the public at the time viewed it as the hiding place of a male author. Her first two novels already gave her a certain financial independence and the maintenance of her own literary salon, which enjoyed great attention among Berlin's educated elites.

Florian Krobb saw in the figure of Jenny a legitimate successor to the Salonièren Rahel Varnhagen von Ense and Henriette Herz in their enlightened, liberal socialization as well as their striving for fulfillment in the female educational path. It is the active search for a modern way of life that Jenny raises above traditional drafts: “All in all, the novel is an appeal for unprejudiced humanity and liberality (...); he denounces the bigotry and narrow-mindedness that stand in the way of a relationship between Christians and Jews. [Thus] the novel (...) represents an assimilatory tendency (...) [as] a plea for a productive symbiosis built on mutual respect under the sign of bourgeois-progressive ideals ”.

Occasionally one saw the problems of acculturation and assimilation in the novel , embodied here by the acceptance of baptism, primarily in the foreground, although in this case the cross-comparison with the conditions in Vienna was a little tried.

expenditure

literature

  • Carol Diethe: Towards emancipation: German women writers of the nineteenth century . Berghahn Books, New York 1998, pp. 83ff.
  • Brigitta van Rheinberg: Fanny Lewald: History of an emancipation . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1990.
  • Ulla Schacht: History in History. The depiction of Jewish life in Fanny Lewald's novel “Jenny” . Wiesbaden 2001.
  • Gabriele Schneider: From the contemporary novel to the “stylized novel”: the narrator Fanny Lewald . Peter Lang Verlag, Frankfurt am Main a. a. 1993.
  • Margaret E. Ward: Fanny Lewald: between rebellion and renunciation . Peter Lang Verlag, New York a. a. 2006.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Compare the list in Petra Wilhelmy: The Berlin Salon in the 19th Century (1780-1914) . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1989, p. 724.
  2. ↑ Gudrun Mari-Boehnecke: Fanny Lewald: Jewish, Prussian, writer. Studies on the autobiographical work and context. Hans-Dieter Heinz, Academic Publishing House, Stuttgart 1998, p. 5.
  3. ↑ Jenny is 17 years old when she is baptized, as was Fanny Lewald when she converted to the Protestant faith.
  4. ↑ He writes: "I feel that I may not call a woman mine to whom the holy faith, which I am called to proclaim, is closed." ( P.256 ).
  5. ↑ On the different characters: Christina Ujma: England and the English in Fanny Lewald's novels and travel reports , In: Susanne Stark (ed.): The novel in Anglo-German context: cultural cross-currents and affinities . Papers from the Conference held at the University of Leeds from September 15 to 17, 1997, Rodopi, Amsterdam / Atlanta 1999, p. 146ff.
  6. ^ Fanny Lewald: Jenny . Brockhaus-Verlag, Leipzig 1843, p. 2.
  7. ^ Fanny Lewald: Jenny . Brockhaus-Verlag, Leipzig 1843, p. 260.
  8. ^ Fanny Lewald: Jenny . Brockhaus-Verlag, Leipzig 1843, p. 261f.
  9. ^ Fanny Lewald: Jenny . Brockhaus-Verlag, Leipzig 1843, p. 262.
  10. ↑ Georg Herwegh: Lullaby . In: Poems of a living person . 2 T., Zurich and Winterthur 1843, p. 88f. Quoted here from: Gerhard Hay / Sibylle von Steinsdorff (ed.): German poetry from the baroque to the present . dtv, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-02077-6 , p. 186.
  11. ↑ On the symbolism of common ivy: leaf extracts against whooping cough - ivy is "Medicinal Plant of the Year 2010"
  12. ↑ Cf. Ulrike Weckel: What can ivy do and for what purpose . In: Barbara Duden (ed.): History in stories: a historical reading book . Campus 2003, pp. 79-83.
  13. ↑ See the similar interpretation in Carol Diethe: Towards emancipation: German women writers of the nineteenth century . Berghahn Books, New York 1998, p. 84.
  14. ↑ In comparison, the misinterpretation of the use by Lewald, which is certainly due to the concentration on Ida Hahn-Hahn, who competed in vain with her . Finally, Lewald uses the relationship between married couples as a deterrent symbol: Kerstin Emmi Hoffmann: Ida Countess Hahn-Hahn: "Countess Faustine" Structuralist analysis of the countesses' image of women . GRIN Verlag, Münster 2010, p. 14.
  15. ^ Fanny Lewald: Felt and Thought (1838-1888) . Edited by Ludwig Geiger , Dresden / Leipzig 1900, p. 153.
  16. ↑ Konstanze Bäumer: Travel as a moment of memory. Fanny Lewalds (1811-1889) years of apprenticeship and traveling . In: Ruth-Ellen B. Joeres / Marianne Burkhard (ed.): Out of line - failed. The paradox of marginality in the writings of 19th-century German women. Rodopi, Amsterdam 1989, pp. 137-160.
  17. ↑ Leaves for literary entertainment, Volume 2, FA Brockhaus, Leipzig 1849, here: No. 306, December 22, 1849, p. 1222.
  18. ↑ See Novellen-Zeitung. Selected novels, short stories, short stories, dramatic and poetic works. Literature, art, music and theater reports. Volume 2, Verlagbuchhandlung by JJ Weber, Leipzig 1846, p. 96.
  19. ^ Johann Georg Theodor Grasse : Textbook of a general literary history of all known peoples of the world: from the oldest to the most recent time . 3rd volume, 1st half, Arnoldische Buchhandlung, Leipzig 1858, p. 562.
  20. ^ Friedrich Wilhelm Hermann Wagener: State and Society Lexicon. New conversation lexicon. In connection with German scholars and statesmen . Edited by Herrmann Wagener , Vol. 19, F. Heinicke, Berlin 1865, p. 665.
  21. ^ Franz JL Thimm: The literature of Germany: from its earliest period to the present time, historically developed . London 1866, p. 214.
  22. ^ Jo Catling: A history of women's writing in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2000, pp. 98f.
  23. ^ Anna Richards: The wasting heroine in German fiction by women 1770-1914 . Oxford University Press, Oxford u. a. 2004 p. 6.
  24. ^ Todd Curtis Kontje: Women, the novel, and the German nation 1771-1871: domestic fiction in the fatherland . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1998, p. 230.
  25. ↑ Friederike Eigler / Susanne Kord (eds.): The feminist encyclopedia of German literature . Greenwood Publishing Group, Westport 1997, p. 286.
  26. ↑ Henry Burnand Garland / Mary Garland (eds.): The Oxford companion to German literature . Oxford University Press, Oxford 1997, p. 526.
  27. ^ M. Saint-René: Littérature en Allemagne depuis les Révolutions de 1848. - L'Histoire, Le Roman et Le Theater . In: Revue des deux mondes, Volume 3, Bruxelles 1850, p. 493.
  28. ↑ Duitschlands literary vrouwen . In: Noord en Zuid: Maendschrift voor Kunsten, letteren en wetenschappen, Volume 2 . G. Adriaens, van Bauvais, Brussel, 1863, p. 78.
  29. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung des Judenthums. An impartial body for all Jewish interests . Edited by Rabbi Dr. Ludwig Philippson in Bonn, Baumgärtner's bookstore, Leipzig 1864, p. 436.
  30. ↑ Meyer Kayserling: The Jewish women in history, literature and art . 1st ed. 1879, ND Ayer Publishing 1980, p. 247.
  31. ^ Kerstin Wiedemann: Between irritation and fascination: George Sand and its German readership in the 19th century . Gunter Narr Verlag, Tübingen 2003, p. 330.
  32. ^ Fanny Lewald: My life story . Vol. 3, Otto Janke, Berlin 1862, p. 23.
  33. ^ Krimhild Stöver: Life and work of Fanny Lewald: Limits and possibilities of a writer in the social context of the 19th century . Igel-Verlag, Oldenburg 2004, p. 58.
  34. ^ Petra Wilhelmy-Dollinger: The Berlin salons: with historical-literary walks . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2000, p. 233ff.
  35. ↑ Florian Krobb: Investigations on German-Jewish narrative literature in the nineteenth century . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2000, p. 129.
  36. ^ Karlheinz Rossbacher: literature and bourgeoisie. Five Viennese Jewish families from the liberal era to the fin de siècle . Böhlau Verlag, Vienna 2003, p. 284.