Black mirrors

Schwarze Spiegel is a short story by the German writer Arno Schmidt (1914–1979). The story, first published in 1951 in the volume Brand's Haide together with the short story Brand's Haide , was later republished together with From the Life of a Faun and Brand's Haide as the last part of the Nobodaddy's Kinder trilogy . The story is about the vagabonding of one of the last people after the great catastrophe of the Third World War , which almost completely destroyed humanity. The ego builds a house for itself in the Lüneburg Heath and finally meets another person there - after seven years without human company.

content

The first part of the story begins on May 1, 1960, five years after the atomic destruction of civilization in the Third World War , which wiped out a large part of human life on earth in particular. The nameless narrator roams alone - he has not seen a living person in "the five years" - on a bicycle through the Lüneburg Heath. He arrives at the Heidedorf Cordingen (near Walsrode ), where he sleeps in a house that is only inhabited by human skeletons and a fox. The next day he explores the deserted place and visits the remains of civilization - he gets excited about magazines, hits and officials and visits the post office.

The first-person narrator, who unmistakably bears features of Arno Schmidt (e.g. date of birth), rides a bicycle and primitive survival equipment through a world that has become deserted by weapons of mass destruction . A reason for his own survival is not given. The catastrophe that occurred “five years ago” from the point of view of 1960, which is assumed to be the time of the narrative, seems to have primarily affected the people - the flora is largely untouched, the fauna decimated, but still present. Nature is spreading again over the remnants of civilization . The immediate location of the action is - typical for Arno Schmidt - the Lüneburg Heath, through which the last survivor, after a long journey from Italy, wandered around before the chance discovery of a former British food store encourages him to settle down and build a wooden house . To equip it - with books and pictures - he goes on a bike ride to the devastated and deserted Hamburg , where he loots museums and libraries.

Often the narrator declares that he is not unhappy about the end of mankind - it has proven to be largely irrational and destructive, and in the end it is “better that way”. He projects the human emptiness into the transcendent and combines “a clever thought game” with his perception, and in this context the title of the story appears: The graphic representation of the unit circle as “the most appropriate symbol of man in space [..], in which everything is reflected "And shortened," whereby the infinity [...] becomes the deepest inner center ", he associates with his contemplation of the night sky: " (Briefly outside). Moon: as a silent stone hump in the rough sea of clouds. Black mirrors lay around a lot ”. Counteracting loneliness, the narrator personifies inanimate nature over and over again; Staggering through the vegetation in the intoxication of alcohol, bushes, trees and wind appear to him as companions that touch him and to whom he sometimes even speaks. He made several attempts to communicate with deceased people "in the empty shells of the houses". For example, he writes from the post office to Mr. Klopstock : "Here the Messiah is back" . The climax of the first part is the proof of Fermat's conjecture, which has not been resolved since the 17th century : “The black dome of the night: from the circular skylight in the zenith it came out poisonously clear and so mockingly bright that the snow burned eyes and soles. I sat on the top of my two wooden steps and wrote on a large sheet: The Problem of Fermat. In , assuming that all quantities are integers, N should never be greater than 2. I quickly proved it to myself as follows: (1) […] The symbols swiftly pulled themselves out of the pencil, and I went on and on; you have to imagine that: I solve the problem of Fermat! (But the time passed in an exemplary manner). “Unfortunately the proof is flawed, it was not until 1994 that Andrew Wiles was able to provide the final proof . ${\ displaystyle A ^ {N} + B ^ {N} = C ^ {N}}$ ${\ displaystyle A ^ {N} = C ^ {N} -B ^ {N}}$

The second part combines a love episode with philosophical thoughts about people. At the beginning, on May 20, 1962, the narrator writes a letter to the American professor Stewart, in which he mentions his story before the nuclear war in his book Man. An Autobiography published views on human history sharply criticized ("in sincere contempt") and then drafts a demanding literary test. As in the first part, he wanders around the area and is suddenly shot at when he, like Robinson Crusoe, “goes to the edge of the forest for me”. Because of his knowledge of the terrain, he manages to get in the back of the shooter and knock him down. That this is a woman is a real shock for the first-person narrator. He decides to secretly unload her weapons while she is still unconscious and to give her the opportunity after she wakes up to accept his offer of a "ceasefire" from the supposedly stronger position. It turns out that her shots were based on a misunderstanding: from a great distance she mistook his binoculars for a weapon and wanted to defend herself. Lisa Weber , the woman's name, only met a few people on her migration from Eastern Europe, but they all perished. She moves into his house with the warm stove and the delicious food and the hermit finds a companion. This is followed by a short phase of playful, spontaneous coexistence and sexual intoxication ( “The afternoon streamed golden and hot” ), which inspires the first-person narrator for an Adam and Eve bohemia in an idyllic setting and at the same time motivates him to make bourgeois plans, with horticulture ("'Next week we will get out the potatoes', I nagged, but she wrinkled her birthday nose indignantly") and a common household ( "We now need everything twice" ). But she carefully leaves her future open ("How do you know that I'm staying?"). In the pauses between love affairs, they discuss the end of civilization and, in Wieland's words, he gives her a long lecture on “the“ human species ”that is“ naturally provided with everything ”,“ something to perceive, observe, compare and differentiation of things is necessary ", but regardless of which, people have been revolving around the same circle of folly, errors and abuses for several thousand years, neither through experiences of others nor of their own become wiser, in short, if it is high comes in an individual, funnier, more astute, more learned, but never wiser. "As the climax of his trust, he gives her his most intimate literary work, reading the memoirs about his lonely childhood woven into his fantasy world (" stiff and dull silver stood in the distance the magic park and waited ... “). This reading is the turning point for them. She tells him that she cannot stay forever and that she has to find more people. His negation of her questions as to whether he also writes for readers and whether he feels any propagandistic or moral task as a writer allows her to recognize his egocentric personality ("there is just about time before I become very sedate. You are too strong for me") . "I must! explains [-] she resolutely ”and justifies her farewell with her gypsy spirit (“ I'm feeling too good with you ”) and her uprooting through three wars. The first-person narrator tries in vain to hold onto it. He remains alone: “the last man. His head up once more : there he stood green in bright red morning clouds. Wind came up too. Wind."

Creation and publication

The idea for Schwarze Spiegel dates back to 1945, when Schmidt developed it as a long mind game while a British prisoner of war. The idea was not revived until 1951; Schmidt lived in Gau-Bickelheim near Mainz at the time. According to his wife Alice's diary , on January 6th of that year he made a more detailed plan for how the idea should be carried out and began taking notes the following day. He himself later noted on the manuscript of Schwarze Spiegel :

"Material collection: 7.1.1951, 8 p.m. - 19.5.51, 10 a.m. Minutes
:
1st part 1.5.51, 10.40 - 12.5.51, 9.15
2nd part 13.5.51, 7.30 - 20.5.51, 12.30
3rd part omitted "

While writing it, Schmidt suddenly had doubts about his work: Alice Schmidt noted in her diary on June 2, 1951: “A. complains that his black mirror is nothing. Is very desperate that he can no longer do anything. I comfort him [...] ", but shortly afterwards he calmed down:" A. now thinks it would be a little better than Brands Haide ”(diary of June 12th). On June 21, Schmidt looked through the manuscript again and typed it in a fair copy from June 22 to 24, which he sent the next day to his publisher Rowohlt . Kurt W. Marek , Rowohlt's editor, criticized the fact that the previous conclusion was not so and suggested that the author come up with a new one, against which Schmidt protested violently. Thereupon Heinrich Maria Ledig-Rowohlt accepted the story without changes for publication on July 21, 1951. He suggested publishing Schwarze Spiegel together with Brand's Haide . Schmidt agreed, leaving the book in October 1951 under the title Brand's Haide. Two stories could appear.

As early as 1953, Schmidt viewed Schwarze Spiegel as part of a trilogy, the other parts of which were Brand's Haide and the short novel From the Life of a Faun , published that year .

Narrative technique

Schwarze Spiegel uses several narrative techniques typical of Schmidt. The plot is told in a mixture of first- person narration and an internal monologue , whereby the view of the small and smallest details of the outside world remains passionately precise. The same applies to the gestures and tones of both characters in the novel - here Schmidt sometimes already neglects the rules of German spelling and approaches a phonetic reproduction of the spoken language, which he only brought to extremes in later works. In the set of image by Schmidt in his fall calculations I as a grid -characterized or "PointillierTechnik" elliptical narrative style to: The epic continuum is broken up into short and very short paragraphs, each describing a snapshot of a perception of a thought, of a situation. These individual "snapshots" are marked in the layout by paragraphs with a hanging indent and a beginning in italics . The reader has to reconstruct for himself what happens or is thought between these fragments. Schmidt tries to portray the “pearl necklace of small units of experience” that, in his opinion, defines life, because “this epic flow, including the present, [does not exist] at all […] the events of our lives rather jump”.

Another feature of Schmidt's narrative technique is the reference to other texts through allusions or marked and unmarked quotations. Even Black Mirror is characterized it. So the second part of the story begins with an explicit reference to the text Man. To the autobiography of the American writer and scientist George R. Stewart , whom the narrator tears in a letter to the author. Via this text reference, however, reference is again made, this time indirectly, to another text by Stewart, because in 1949 he published the post-apocalyptic warning utopia Earth abides , which has parallels in content and structure to Schwarze Spiegel . Elsewhere, the narrator is given a long lament , literally by Christoph Martin Wieland , about the irrationality of humanity. Works and artists are also mentioned and quoted throughout, such as The Rumor by A. Paul Weber , Satanstoe by James Fenimore Cooper or Under der linden by Walther von der Vogelweide (209). These intertextual insertions can often be directly or indirectly related to the content of Schwarze Spiegel . Schmidt also quotes himself in one passage when he inserts the beginning of his short story Der Rebell (1941/49) in the form of a fictional biographical report by his first-person narrator in Schwarze Spiegel . Heinrich Schwier therefore understands Schwarze Spiegel as a “literary palimpsest ”, ie as a text that preserves the “memories, remnants of memories and signatures of different times deposited in many layers”.

Another point of reference in the work is Schmidt's own life and work, which often appears incidentally. Once the narrator mentions the place Gau-Bickelheim, where Schmidt wrote the story, another time the protagonist even penetrates the Schmidts' former apartment in the Mühlenhof in Cordingen.

analysis

Schwarze Spiegel is shaped by the narrator's inner conflict, who is torn between the satisfaction of finally being alone and the longing for company. On the one hand, there is the description of the deserted Lüneburg Heath as an idyll : nature is often depicted in pictures that have been worked out down to the last detail and that show a number of topoi of an idyll. Above all, the description of the place where the narrator wants to build a house is reminiscent of the traditional, idyllic topos of locus amoenus : “ I had lost my direction inside and suddenly found myself at the edge of the forest, only a hundred meters from the track a small free space. Junipers formed two fine semicircles: they had to be very old plants, judging by their size [...]. The floor was also so firm and clean that I sighed comfortably and sank down. Wonderful! [/] […] [/] Mailicher rain: I sat in it serenely like a stone: nice to rain through on the edge of the forest in complete calm (in May country; not Milano) and I moved my damp shoulders and calves with delight ”(p . 214). The interposed play on words “In May Land; nicht Milano ”alludes to the frequent identification of the perfect idyll with Italy , which can be found above all in Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Italian Journey : Schmidt relocates the idyll from southern Europe ( Arcadia is a Greek landscape) to the northern German lowlands, which he loves . This is also indicated by a few other ironic allusions to Italy, for example when Schmidt counteracts a scene on a Neapolitan market square immediately afterwards with a North German "Has rained a lot." (212f.).

Furthermore, Black Mirror contains the motif of a Robinsonade . Schmidt gives the reference to Daniel Defoe's famous Robinson Crusoe in the story himself: “ I went there for myself at the edge of the forest, literally: completely without intent. Like Robinson with two shotguns, and, because of the midday sun, under the white canopy […]. ”In terms of content, Schwarze Spiegel shows a number of parallels: The“ stranded ”narrator is completely on his own, like Robinson, he initially feeds on the legacies of the Civilization (in Robinson's case in the form of the shipwreck) before he builds a house and fields like them. Lisa can also be interpreted as a female Friday in this sense. Unlike Robinson, who returns to England at the end, the narrator in Schwarze Spiegel does not, at least ostensibly , long for lost society. Civilization is also not - as in Johann Gottfried Schnabel's Robinsonade Insel Felsenburg - newly founded and rebuilt.

On the contrary, human civilization is sometimes heavily criticized, which begins with the dedication poem that introduces the first edition: “You know: this book is for [/] Werner Murawski; [/] born on November 29, 1924 [/] in Wiesa near Greiffenberg am Gebirge; [/] fallen on November 17, 1943 off Smolensk; [/] how easy it is to calculate [/] not yet 19 years old. And he [/] the only brother of my wife, [/] the last [/] with whom I was young: Oh: [/] […] [/] And every party is already chatting about common conscription again : What ? ? ! ! - chamber servants; [/] Goblin and owl; [/] what are you not clawing the Pocher away; [/] Werner is sleeping. "The criticism of German militarism is again sarcastically taken up within the story:" Thanks from the fatherland: in those good times after the First World War that meant: an organ organ and the pronotum 'no pension'. (But the Germans shouted twice more for males, and "It's so nice to be a soldier": they asked for it, and they got it!) "(P. 213). In a conversation with Lisa, the narrator expands his pessimistic view of human beings by quoting a longer passage from a work by Christoph Martin Wieland: People do not usually reason according to the laws of reason. "

reception

After Schmidt's first work Leviathan had received mostly positive reviews from the critics and was even awarded the literary prize of the Academy of Sciences and Literature in Mainz, his second book publication, Brand's Haide , for such a new author has now also received an extraordinarily extensive reception. In the period after the publication of Brand's Haide and before the publication of the next book Die Umsiedler , ie 1951–1953, 38 journalistic texts appeared about Schmidt, mostly dealing with the new publication with the two stories Brand's Haide and Schwarze Spiegel , but often also the Leviathan still reviewed. Of the 38 texts, 23 had a positive tenor, ten a rather negative, five can be described as neutral.

The reviews were mostly based on the exuberant blurb that the Rowohlt publishing house had included with the book. In it Hermann Hesse was quoted as saying that Schmidt was "a real poet"; Schmidt was designated as the successor to James Joyce , Hans Henny Jahnn and Alfred Döblin ; it was attested that he wrote “like Georges Braque and Max Ernst paint”. The blurb of Schwarze Spiegel read: “The atomized world of the future and the last human beings will be conjured up in a visionary way.” The reviews of the new volume were based on these illustrious comparisons and either rejected or affirmed them, for better or for worse.

The conservative critic Hans Egon Holthusen gave the book a rather negative review for the Deutsche Zeitung . He criticizes Schmidt's exuberant reception and quotes the blurb, which he also considers exaggerated. Holthusen points out that Schmidt is not an avant-garde, but rather that he is succeeding James Joyce , with whose style Schmidt shows strong similarities. Schmidt has not yet found a real topic. The review closes with the statement: "He too is one of the many young authors who are passionate about experimenting and who promise a lot for the future."

Hermann Kasack compares Schmidt in his review for the New Literary World ( Darmstadt ) with a “poetic seismograph” that “relentlessly records the tremors in the outer and inner world”. For him, Arno Schmidt is “the boldest pioneer of modern German epic”. Kasack particularly emphasizes the "dynamic of the word", the "precision of the statement" and the "rhythm of the language".

The annotated study edition published in 2006 in the Suhrkamp Basis Library as well as a material volume by Jochen Hengst with suggestions for the lesson have made the story accessible for school lessons as well.

expenditure

Arno Schmidt: Black mirrors . In: Arno Schmidt: Brand's Haide. Two stories . Rowohlt, Hamburg 1951, pp. 153-259 (first edition).
Arno Schmidt: Black mirrors . In: Arno Schmidt: Nobodaddy's children. Trilogy. From the life of a faun, Brand's Haide, Schwarze Spiegel . Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg 1963, pp. 169–226 (first edition as a trilogy).
Arno Schmidt: Black mirrors . In: Arno Schmidt: Leviathan and Black Mirrors . Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1974, ISBN 3-436-01915-1 , pp. 41–141 (first paperback edition).
Arno Schmidt: Black mirrors . In: Arno Schmidt: Works. Bargfeld edition . Werkgruppe I, Volume 1, Haffmans, Zurich 1987, pp. 199–260 (authoritative edition).
Arno Schmidt: Black mirrors . With a comment by Oliver Jahn. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main 2006, ISBN 978-3-518-18871-2 (Suhrkamp BasisBibliothek, Volume 71; introductory study edition).

literature

Georg Guntermann: The withdrawal as criticism. “Black Mirrors” as a literary contemporary document . In: Paper Box 11, 1992, pp 61-106.
Kai U. Jürgens : Ni Dieu, Ni Maîtresse. Exile and eroticism in Arno Schmidt's »Nobodaddy's Children« . Verlag Ludwig, Kiel 2000, ISBN 3-933598-17-6 .
Hartmut Vollmer: The bliss of last people: Arno Schmidt's “Black Mirror” . In: Michael Matthias Schardt (Ed.): Arno Schmidt. The early work II: novels. Interpretation from 'Brand's Haide' to 'Scholars' republic' . Alano Verlag, Aachen 1988, ISBN 3-924007-72-1 , pp. 55-98.

Commentary volumes

Lutz Hagestedt , André Kischel: Lord of the world. Commentary manual on Arno Schmidt's Black Mirror . belleville, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-933510-40-2 .
Heinrich Schwier: Nobody. A commentary on Arno Schmidt's “Black Mirror” . edition text + kritik, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-88377-816-7 .

Radio play editing

Black mirrors . Radio play with Corinna Harfouch , Ulrich Wildgruber . Editing: Klaus Buhlert / Herbert Kapfer, composition and direction: Klaus Buhlert. Bayerischer Rundfunk 1997. Length: 86'03. As a podcast / download in the BR radio play pool.

Remarks

↑ BA I / 1, p. 201. All quotations from Schwarze Spiegel will be based on the Bargfeld edition (BA). The unusual typography is also taken from there. Slashes [/] in square brackets mark transitions between the “grids”.
^ Arno Schmidt, Calculations II , in: Bargfelder Edition. Work group III: Essays and Biographical Issues, Volume 3: Essays and Essays 1 , pp. 275–284, p. 278.
↑ On the origin and first publication cf. Bernd Rauschenbach , editorial epilogue to the genesis of the trilogy , in: Arno Schmidt, Nobodaddy's Kinder , Haffmans, Zurich 1991, pp. 245–247 (quoted in Schwier, Nobody , pp. 306f.).
↑ On the narrative technique of Jörg Drews , Nobodaddy's Kinder , in: Kindlers new literature lexicon , Volume 14, Kindler Verlag, Munich 1990, pp. 999–1001, here p. 1000.
^ ^A ^b Arno Schmidt, Calculations I (1954), in: Bargfelder Edition. Work group III: Essays and Biographical , Volume 3: Essays and Essays 1 , pp. 163–168, here pp. 167f., Cf. Quote on the website of the Arno Schmidt Foundation .
↑ Cf. the programmatic statement “ My life? ! : Is not a continuum! (Not just broken into white and black pieces by day and night! For even during the day there is someone else with me who goes to the train station; sits in office; books; stilts through groves; mates; chatters; writes; thinkers of the thousands; fans falling apart ; he runs; smokes; feces; listens to the radio; "Herr Landrat" says: that's me!): a tray full of glittering snapshots ", in: Arno Schmidt, From the life of a Faun , in: BA I / 1, p. 300– 390, here p. 301 (on this also Dieter Kuhn, Commentary Handbook on Arno Schmidt's novel "From the Life of a Faun" , edition text + kritik, Munich 1986, pp. 10-13).
↑ See for example Michael Müller, Erotik und Solitäre Existence. Functions of the text reference in Arno Schmidt's trilogy Nobodaddy's Kinder , Friedl Brehm Verlag, Munich 1989. However, Müller only refers to the explicit text references.
↑ Schwier, Nobody , p. 14. On this in detail Heinrich Schwier, Black Mirror as Palimpsest , in: Bargfelder Bote , Liefer 300, p. XX.
↑ See also Axel Dunker, Im Wacholderring or »The next footpath towards Arcadia«. Arno Schmidt's story »Black Mirrors« as an idyll , in: Robert Weninger (Ed.), Repeated Mirroring. Eleven essays on Arno Schmidt's work , edition text + kritik, Munich 2003, pp. 99–115, on Italy in particular 105–107.
↑ BA I / 1, p. 238. “ I went there for myself at the edge of the forest, ” is an allusion to the poem Found by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, whose first stanza reads: “I went in the forest [/] so for me there, [/] And nothing to look for [/] That was my sense. "(Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, found , in: Goethe's Werke. Complete edition last hand , Volume 1, JG Cotta'sche Buchhandlung, Stuttgart and Tübingen 1827, P. 26). On allusion and its function, Dunker, Im Wacholderring , p. 100. Cf. also Schwier, Nobody , p. 219.
↑ On the Robinsonade Götz Müller, Utopie und Robinsonade by Arno Schmidt , in: text + kritik , Issue 20 / 20a: Arno Schmidt , 4th edition, November 1986, pp. 71–91, here pp. 71–75.
↑ The dedication poem can initially only be found in the first edition (Arno Schmidt, Brand's Haide. Zwei Erzählungen , Reinbek 1951, p. 154) and does not appear in later editions. It was also included in the Bargfeld edition ( Yes: overnight!, In: BA I / 4, p. 168). Quoted here from Schwier, Nobody , p. 300.
↑ BA I / 1, pp. 245–247, here p. 245. It is a passage from Wieland's novel History of the Wise Danischmend and the Three Calendars. An appendix to the history of Scheschian (in: Christoph Martin Wieland: Sämmliche Werke , Vol. III / 8, Chapter 13, pp. 104-109). On this see Schwier, Nobody , p. 233f. - Schmidt does not make the quotation explicit, so it was overlooked by some researchers (for example by Michael Müller, Erotik und Solitäre Existence. Functions of the text reference in Arno Schmidt's trilogy Nobodaddy's Kinder , Friedl Brehm Verlag, Munich 1989).
↑ For the reaction of the reviewers, cf. Ralf Stiftel, Brand's Haide (1951–1953) , in: Ders., Die Rezensenten and Arno Schmidt , Diss., Bangert & Metzler, Frankfurt am Main and Wiesenbach 1996, ISBN 3-924147-38-8 , pp. 46–65 . A selection of important reviews is provided by Hans-Michael Bock (Ed.), About Arno Schmidt. Reviews from “Leviathan” to “Julia” , Haffmans Verlag, Zurich 1984, ISBN 3-251-00031-4 , pp. 19-27.
↑ Stiftel, Brand's Haide , p. 50.
↑ Hesse had stated this in a letter: Hermann Hesse, Arno Schmidts 'Leviathan'. A letter to friends , 1949, in: Jörg Drews, Hans-Michael Bock, Der Solipsist in der Heide. Materials on Arno Schmidt's work , edition text + kritik, Munich 1974, p. 7.
↑ The blurb is quoted in full in Stiftel, Brand's Haide , p. 46.
^ Hans Egon Holthusen, Bärendienst für Arno Schmidt , in: Deutsche Zeitung , December 8, 1951. Printed in: Bock, About Arno Schmidt , pp. 19f.
^ Hermann Kasack, Ein poetischer Seismograph , in: Neue Literäre Welt , Darmstadt, January 10, 1952. Printed in: Bock, About Arno Schmidt , p. 21.
↑ Jochen Hengst, Photography with Language? Arno Schmidt's story Schwarze Spiegel , Raabe, Stuttgart 2008 (RAAbits. Impulses and materials for creative teaching German / literature, secondary level I / II, delivery November 2008).
↑ Nobodaddy's Children - Black Mirrors. BR radio play Pool

[1] BA I / 1, p. 201. All quotations from Schwarze Spiegel will be based on the Bargfeld edition (BA). The unusual typography is also taken from there. Slashes [/] in square brackets mark transitions between the “grids”.

[2] Arno Schmidt, Calculations II , in: Bargfelder Edition. Work group III: Essays and Biographical Issues, Volume 3: Essays and Essays 1 , pp. 275–284, p. 278.

[3] On the origin and first publication cf. Bernd Rauschenbach , editorial epilogue to the genesis of the trilogy , in: Arno Schmidt, Nobodaddy's Kinder , Haffmans, Zurich 1991, pp. 245–247 (quoted in Schwier, Nobody , pp. 306f.).

[4] On the narrative technique of Jörg Drews , Nobodaddy's Kinder , in: Kindlers new literature lexicon , Volume 14, Kindler Verlag, Munich 1990, pp. 999–1001, here p. 1000.

[Berechnungen_I-5] A ^b Arno Schmidt, Calculations I (1954), in: Bargfelder Edition. Work group III: Essays and Biographical , Volume 3: Essays and Essays 1 , pp. 163–168, here pp. 167f., Cf. Quote on the website of the Arno Schmidt Foundation .

[6] Cf. the programmatic statement “ My life? ! : Is not a continuum! (Not just broken into white and black pieces by day and night! For even during the day there is someone else with me who goes to the train station; sits in office; books; stilts through groves; mates; chatters; writes; thinkers of the thousands; fans falling apart ; he runs; smokes; feces; listens to the radio; "Herr Landrat" says: that's me!): a tray full of glittering snapshots ", in: Arno Schmidt, From the life of a Faun , in: BA I / 1, p. 300– 390, here p. 301 (on this also Dieter Kuhn, Commentary Handbook on Arno Schmidt's novel "From the Life of a Faun" , edition text + kritik, Munich 1986, pp. 10-13).

[7] See for example Michael Müller, Erotik und Solitäre Existence. Functions of the text reference in Arno Schmidt's trilogy Nobodaddy's Kinder , Friedl Brehm Verlag, Munich 1989. However, Müller only refers to the explicit text references.

[8] Schwier, Nobody , p. 14. On this in detail Heinrich Schwier, Black Mirror as Palimpsest , in: Bargfelder Bote , Liefer 300, p. XX.

[9] See also Axel Dunker, Im Wacholderring or »The next footpath towards Arcadia«. Arno Schmidt's story »Black Mirrors« as an idyll , in: Robert Weninger (Ed.), Repeated Mirroring. Eleven essays on Arno Schmidt's work , edition text + kritik, Munich 2003, pp. 99–115, on Italy in particular 105–107.

[10] BA I / 1, p. 238. “ I went there for myself at the edge of the forest, ” is an allusion to the poem Found by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, whose first stanza reads: “I went in the forest [/] so for me there, [/] And nothing to look for [/] That was my sense. "(Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, found , in: Goethe's Werke. Complete edition last hand , Volume 1, JG Cotta'sche Buchhandlung, Stuttgart and Tübingen 1827, P. 26). On allusion and its function, Dunker, Im Wacholderring , p. 100. Cf. also Schwier, Nobody , p. 219.

[11] On the Robinsonade Götz Müller, Utopie und Robinsonade by Arno Schmidt , in: text + kritik , Issue 20 / 20a: Arno Schmidt , 4th edition, November 1986, pp. 71–91, here pp. 71–75.

[12] The dedication poem can initially only be found in the first edition (Arno Schmidt, Brand's Haide. Zwei Erzählungen , Reinbek 1951, p. 154) and does not appear in later editions. It was also included in the Bargfeld edition ( Yes: overnight!, In: BA I / 4, p. 168). Quoted here from Schwier, Nobody , p. 300.

[13] BA I / 1, pp. 245–247, here p. 245. It is a passage from Wieland's novel History of the Wise Danischmend and the Three Calendars. An appendix to the history of Scheschian (in: Christoph Martin Wieland: Sämmliche Werke , Vol. III / 8, Chapter 13, pp. 104-109). On this see Schwier, Nobody , p. 233f. - Schmidt does not make the quotation explicit, so it was overlooked by some researchers (for example by Michael Müller, Erotik und Solitäre Existence. Functions of the text reference in Arno Schmidt's trilogy Nobodaddy's Kinder , Friedl Brehm Verlag, Munich 1989).

[14] For the reaction of the reviewers, cf. Ralf Stiftel, Brand's Haide (1951–1953) , in: Ders., Die Rezensenten and Arno Schmidt , Diss., Bangert & Metzler, Frankfurt am Main and Wiesenbach 1996, ISBN 3-924147-38-8 , pp. 46–65 . A selection of important reviews is provided by Hans-Michael Bock (Ed.), About Arno Schmidt. Reviews from “Leviathan” to “Julia” , Haffmans Verlag, Zurich 1984, ISBN 3-251-00031-4 , pp. 19-27.

[15] Stiftel, Brand's Haide , p. 50.

[16] Hesse had stated this in a letter: Hermann Hesse, Arno Schmidts 'Leviathan'. A letter to friends , 1949, in: Jörg Drews, Hans-Michael Bock, Der Solipsist in der Heide. Materials on Arno Schmidt's work , edition text + kritik, Munich 1974, p. 7.

[17] The blurb is quoted in full in Stiftel, Brand's Haide , p. 46.

[18] Hans Egon Holthusen, Bärendienst für Arno Schmidt , in: Deutsche Zeitung , December 8, 1951. Printed in: Bock, About Arno Schmidt , pp. 19f.

[19] Hermann Kasack, Ein poetischer Seismograph , in: Neue Literäre Welt , Darmstadt, January 10, 1952. Printed in: Bock, About Arno Schmidt , p. 21.

[20] Jochen Hengst, Photography with Language? Arno Schmidt's story Schwarze Spiegel , Raabe, Stuttgart 2008 (RAAbits. Impulses and materials for creative teaching German / literature, secondary level I / II, delivery November 2008).

[21] Nobodaddy's Children - Black Mirrors. BR radio play Pool