Oberman. Novel in letters

Oberman. Roman in Letters is a letter novel by the French writer Étienne Pivert de Senancour , (1770–1846), which began in Paris in 1801 , completed in Switzerland in 1803 and published in two volumes in 1804. It is considered to be one of the most important works of French early romanticism .

There is no clear plot in the novel: the protagonist writes to a (possibly imaginary) recipient who remains just as in the dark as other characters. While Oberman travels to Switzerland , he indulges in philosophical considerations, which he puts down in his letters. Oberman is haunted by a "tristesse d'une vague profonde", an inexplicable melancholy that drives him from one place to another, makes him despair and condemned to inactivity. Typically romantic in Oberman are the enthusiastic descriptions of nature .

Many artists served Oberman as a source of inspiration, u. a. Liszt or Delacroix . Liszt called Oberman "the book that always numbs my suffering". Vallée d'Obermann is the title of a piano piece in his Années de pèlerinage .

The Oberman served as a template for the radio play of the same name by Rainer Römer (hr 2006), which was named Radio Play of the Month in March 2006 .

German translation

• Oberman. Novel in letters . Translated from the French by Jürg Peter Walser. Insel, Frankfurt am Main 1982, ISBN 3-458-14007-7 .

Secondary literature

• P. Barth: The description of nature in Senancour's Obermann. Dissertation. Tubingen 1911.