Raffael and his neighbors

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Raffael and his neighbors is a story by Achim von Arnim , which - written around 1822 - was published in the "Pocket Book for the Sociable Pleasure of the Year 1824" by Johann Friedrich Gleditsch in 1823 in Leipzig.

Raphael's assistant Baviera tells of his master's love for the potter Benedetta and the baker Ghita .

content

Baviera has seen Raffael’s last twelve years. So he lets the master speak personally when it comes to weaving a very special youthful experience into his memories. This is the story of Raphael's first paintings at home in Urbino . The delicate potter Benedetta works in the neighboring garden during the day. At night before the burning, the young man in love secretly paints the beautiful young worker's clay plates. When the father wants to apprentice the young Raphael to his friend Pietro in Perugia , it is time to say goodbye. Raffael climbs over the wall again and wants to give Benedetta a ring that is dear to him. The girl refuses. But the plump young baker Ghita - tall and strong - also a neighbor, comes along and wants to own the ring. Out of embarrassment, Raffael drops the ring. When falling, the piece of jewelery slides down the three limbs on the finger of a female statue - a beautiful marble picture in the cozy pottery garden. When Ghita wants to pull off the ring, that is not possible. Because the finger is suddenly bent. When Benedetta afterwards reaches for the ring, she can pull it off without any effort.

Years later in Rome a beautiful baker becomes Ghita Raphael's lover. Over the years Baviera has observed how the baker hides a pregnancy from the painter twice. Ghita is not very particular about loyalty. She gets involved with Raphael's friend Bartolommeo , among others . Towards the end of his life, when Raphael was tackling his great work, the Transfiguration, he remembers the experience of his youth. The scene stands in front of his soul: “I can still see the blue air with the light, golden clouds, as they once stood over the house of the beloved.” The model, that is that statue in the distant home of Urbino, becomes the Madonna. The work succeeds. Before Raffael dies, he experiences happiness. When he was painting the Madonna with St. Sixtus at Cardinal Bibiena's , he met his two sons. Cardinal Bibiena then visits the painter for a return visit and introduces him to his niece Benedetta. His Eminence reminds the painter of the promise to marry Benedetta. Benedetta reveals herself as Raphael's childhood sweetheart through the ring and shows the father of the two boys in the picture. Her two children gave birth to the godless Ghita. The wedding does not come. Benedetta does not want the connection warned by the cardinal either. First, she wanted to sever the bond of sin. This also fails. The sick Raffael dies. Its ruin is a malpractice of the master Galeno. This is the personal doctor of Raphael's employer, the Pope . Raphael's boys enter the clergy early.

Self-testimony

  • On January 29, 1824, Arnim wrote to the Brothers Grimm : "She [the story] has found more favor among the people than I could have expected."

reception

  • On February 14, 1824, Ludwig Sigismund Ruhl called the text “a wonderful work of prophetic poetry”.
  • Kratzsch describes the novella as "formally perfect". Arnim is looking for the essence of art in it.
  • Arnim had seen works by Raphael in Dresden in November 1801.
  • According to Japp, Arnim has the material from Vasari's résumés . The competence of the narrator Baviera, a former beggar, was deliberately designed by Arnim as extremely questionable for several reasons. The well-meaning reader can, for example, accept two miracles a little more easily through this back door. Firstly, the statue in the potter's garden is meant. This can bend your finger. And secondly, Benedetta and Ghita only appear in Urbino and years later in Rome, which is a bit distant.

literature

  • Giorgio Vasari : CVs of the most famous painters, sculptors and architects. Translation from the Italian by Trude Fein using the German edition by L. Schorn and E. Förster. Notes by W. Rotzler and E. Deer. Afterword by R. Steiner. With 28 illustrations. 675 pages. Manesse Zurich 1974. Manesse Library of World Literature (1st edition)
  • Renate Moering (Ed.): Achim von Arnim. All stories 1818–1830. Vol. 4 in: Roswitha Burwick (Ed.), Jürgen Knaack (Ed.), Paul Michael Lützeler (Ed.), Renate Moering (Ed.), Ulfert Ricklefs (Ed.), Hermann F. Weiss (Ed.): Achim von Arnim. Works in six volumes. 1436 pages. Deutscher Klassiker Verlag Frankfurt am Main 1992 (1st edition), ISBN 3-618-60040-2
  • Uwe Japp: The identity of the artist. Arnim's story Raphael and his neighbors (PDF; 143 kB). 13 pages. Max Niemeyer, Tübingen 2003

expenditure

Quoted text edition

  • Achim von Arnim: Raffael and his neighbors. Narration . P. 493-550 in Konrad Kratzsch (Ed.): Achim von Arnim: Erzählungen. 635 pages. Aufbau-Verlag Berlin and Weimar 1968 (1st edition)

Web links

Individual evidence

Source means the quoted text edition

  1. Moering, pp. 1109-1135
  2. Source, p. 532, 7. Zvo
  3. ↑ In the meantime Cardinal Bibiena had the marble picture brought to Rome. There it got its place in a church.
  4. Moering, p. 1114
  5. Ruhl writes the adjective true like this.
  6. Moering, p. 1124
  7. ^ Kratzsch in the afterword of the source, p. 616, 18. Zvo
  8. Moering, p. 1115
  9. Japp, p. 2 below
  10. Japp, from p. 11 below