Theseus (André Gide)

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Theseus , the last work by André Gide , is a short story that appeared in 1946 under the title “Thésée” in the Éditions Gallimard / Paris.

When his life comes to an end, the Greek hero Theseus , ruler of Attica , looks back.

shape

Theseus narrates episodes from his vita with a wink. With a light tongue, the hero sees himself as he has always seen himself in life - as a person in development. But sadness also plays a role when Theseus looks back on his carefree youthful years, which were filled with adventures. But calmly, in serenity, he says goodbye to his heroic life in agreement with himself.

Outside of the actual plot outlined below, the narrative takes on the traits of a social utopia when the aged city founder Theseus, who “was always only good as an individual”, gets into raptures .

action

Prince Theseus goes to the court of the Cretan King Minos with seven Attic youths and seven girls . Theseus does not want his 14 young compatriots to be handed over to the Minotaur , as he does every year , but wants to fight him. Queen Pasiphae asks the traveling hero to spare her "malformed" son after all. Pasiphae desires Theseus, but the latter gives in to the desire of the eldest princess Ariadne . Soon tired of making love, the hero goes to work, penetrates the labyrinth to the son of the Cretan bull and defeats him. The princess helps. She waits at the labyrinth entrance, holds Theseus by the thread . So he finds his way back with his fellow countrymen. Ariadne's devotion goes against the hero, who anyway wants to kidnap Phaedra , Ariadne's very young sister, to Attica. On the way home Theseus leaves Ariadne behind on Naxos . At home he usurps the rule of the king with a murderous trick and makes Phaedra his queen. Admittedly, this marriage does not end happily. Phaedra falls in love with her stepson Hippolytos , whom Theseus had once fathered with the Amazon queen Antiope . Theseus mourns his beloved son, but keeps silent about the end of the lovers.

Theseus reported on several occasions his alleged heroic deeds - the founding of Athens and the upbringing of the Athenians to be Greeks, "to whom the beautiful name of the people" fits.

Quotes

  • The first and most important victories of man were those over the gods .
  • Because it is not enough to be and to have been: you have to leave a legacy so that you don't stop with yourself .

reception

  • Gides Theseus is "a figure between rogue and stoic, between revolutionary and worldly."
  • According to Martin, Theseus is "a clever concentrate of his [Gides] wisdom."
  • In her epilogue “To Theseus ” Viragh is unsure. Does Gide's “misogyny” speak from the description of the relationship between Ariadne and Theseus, which takes up a large part of the story? Should this last work of Gide be taken as his “literary testament”? After all, the author has chosen a hero as the protagonist. When Viragh surveys the "Theseus", she concludes that the hero is both a gide and an "anti-gide". And the afterword writer attests to the author a message that is aesthetically pleasing, namely “perfect prose”.

German editions

source
  • Raimund Theis (Ed.), Peter Schnyder (Ed.): André Gide: Theseus , pp. 263–306. Translated from the French by Ernst Robert Curtius . Collected works in twelve volumes. Volume X / 4, Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt Stuttgart 1997. 363 pages, ISBN 3-421-06470-9
German-language first edition
  • André Gide: Theseus . Translator: Ernst Robert Curtius. Drawings by Theodor-Werner Schröder. Deutsche Verlagsanstalt Stuttgart 1949. 64 pages with 20 black-and-white illustrations. Half linen with gold embossed title on the back
Secondary literature
  • Renée Lang: André Gide and the German spirit (French: André Gide et la Pensée Allemande ). Translation: Friedrich Hagen . Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt Stuttgart 1953. 266 pages
  • Claude Martin: André Gide . Translated from the French by Ingeborg Esterer. P. 157, 9. Zvu Rowohlt 1963 (July 1987 edition). 176 pages, ISBN 3-499-50089-2

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Source, p. 6
  2. ↑ Theseus says of himself: "As soon as the novelty becomes stale, I have only one wish: continue!" (Source, p. 280, 7th line)
  3. ↑ Source, p. 299, 4th Zvo to p. 300, 11th Zvo
  4. ↑ Source, p. 267, 5th Zvu
  5. ↑ Source, p. 268, 9. Zvu
  6. ^ From Deutsche Zeitung , Stuttgart, quoted in a DVA publishing supplement in the translated book by Renée Lang
  7. ↑ Claude Martin, p. 127, 13. Zvo
  8. ↑ Christina Viragh in the source, pp. 350 to 357
  9. ↑ Source, p. 355, 13. Zvu