Restless guests

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Restless guests. A novel from the Säkulum by Wilhelm Raabe was written from June to October 1884 and was published in 1885 in the gazebo . The work was published in book form in 1886 by Grote in Berlin. Raabe has seen two reprints.

The love of the gentleman scholar Baron Professor Dr. Veit von Bielow-Altrippen to the parish lady Phöbe Hahnemeyer is unhappy.

content

Veit moves away from the Säkulum, more precisely from the spa hotel in the valley. The young man "from temporality", a cheerful, moderate character with a healthy body and sufficient ability, enjoys himself on his "Pläsierreise". He carelessly climbs up to the mountain village of Prudens Hahnemeyer, his fellow student from the good old days in Halle . The host Prudens, formerly Studiosus Theologiae, has meanwhile become pastor up in the forest. The guest is entertained by Phöbe, the pastor's 20-year-old sister. Veit has walked through the summer hallways with his eyes open. He mentions the existence of the quarantine barrack for typhus patients outside the village. Phöbe, formerly the “nurse and teacher of the small children in the idiot school in Halah”, goes in and out of the barracks. She reports news to her brother. Anna Fuchs died of typhus there. Volkmar Fuchs, the husband of the dead, refuses to give a Christian burial. He wants to bury his wife in the forest. Because Anna should not lie next to the dead of those who deported the Fuchs couple and their children in quarantine outside the village.

The village chief has to get Anna's funeral in the churchyard, but he has due respect for the wooden ax and the six-barreled revolver of the notorious poacher and convict Volkmar Fuchs. Believes the head sends the minister against the winner of the Iron Cross anno 1870 before and best shooters of the village. Prudens drinks from Volkmar's bottle, but is rudely rejected by the host despite passing the test of courage. The village chief doesn't give up. He persuades Phoebe to go into the barracks. The girl, whom Anna Fuchs looked after to the last, is supposed to persuade the stubborn widower to have a church funeral. In addition, the stingy supervisor wants to avoid the funeral costs. Prudens and Phoebe are poor. Veit interferes. He wants to bear the costs. Such a guest as the newcomer Veit is very welcome at the headmaster.

Land physicist Dr. Hanff rides up from Veits Kurort on a health police mission for an eyepiece inspection and meets an acquaintance from the spa hotel in the pastor's house - Professor Veit von Bielow.

Phoebe warns Veit urgently of the risk of infection to which he will be exposed in the barrack with the dead woman laid out. Veit cannot be turned away. He has neither parents nor siblings. The guest is silent about his Valerie. So the professor accompanies the girl to the Vierlingwiese. In the barracks Volkmar Fuchs recognizes at a glance that the gentleman next to Phöbe comes from the noble world. The widower - bent over the expensive corpse - prepares the private burial. Because Veit is with Phöbe, Volkmar Fuchs does not want to refuse the stranger to actively participate in the imminent burial in the forest. Veit makes a surprising offer. Anna Fuchs is to rest in God's peace between the future tombs of Phoebe and Veit at his expense. Phoebe is astonished. Volkmar Fuchs gives in. He “does not turn the corpse of his wife into a weapon in his struggle with society”, but rather quickly responds to the unexpected proposal.

After the church burial, Volkmar Fuchs sneaks away from the cemetery with his children “shy, tamed and ashamed”. Only Phöbe and the "guest who is so seriously connected to this place" remain in front of the three grave sites. Phöbe listens to Veit's farewell and answers his wish to see you again: “Dear friends, we must truly stay on earth for all of our days.” The farewell climbs down from the tragedy of the mountain forest into the comedy of the “hasty talkers and nervous noise makers ”in his spa hotel. The restless guest Veit - together with his Valerie again - meets Dr. Hemp. Miss Valerie learns every detail of the tragedy through the talkative spa doctor. She cannot understand Veit's detour. Together with a local, the young lady visits Volkmar Fuchs in the mountains, eats with him with a shudder and learns the truth from her host: “I hadn't had sunshine like this for weeks ... like the two of them, Miss Phöbe and him Herr Baron, you were standing in it [in the barrack] and made your suggestion to me. When they became one in their soul before death, it only dawned on me in my soul as a light: 'And you gave something to the pack around you, fox, when such a thing is possible in the world?' " Valerie then goes to Fraulein Phöbe Hahnemeyer. The beautiful "restless guest" absolutely wants to take a look at the three graves. "Unspeakable fear" strikes Phöbe in view of the strangers who have suddenly become strict and angry. Phoebe obeys and leads the lady to the cemetery. Valerie remains in the churchyard. Again she cannot understand her Vitus.

Back in the hotel, Valerie learns that Dr. Hanff diagnosed "gastric complications" in Baron Bielow. Hotel guests leave the “famous spa” in droves in the middle of the season. The shares of the corporation fall fifty percent. How could the baron crawl around in the bushes to "introduce typhus into society"!

In his last lucid moments, Veit writes down his will illegibly and confusedly. He wants to be brought to Volkmar Fuchs in the quarantine barrack. He is entitled to do so and appeals to Phoebe. However, the baron is housed outside the health resort in the renovated infirmary, now called Villa Bielow, in accordance with the latest findings in disinfection theory - deported like the Fuchs family. When Phöbe learns of the hasty departure of the “fine woman” Valerie, she rushes to the infirmary and helps Veits with the care. Dr. Hanff had defended himself in vain against Phoebes commitment. The baron survived the illness and married Valerie. The honeymoon takes the young couple on the run from the "Germanic grayness" to Palermo . In a letter from Sicily to his college friend, the ascetic pastor Prudens Hahnemeyer, the baron distances himself from the thoughtless purchase of his grave in the forest and regrets Phoebe.

Quotes

  • "Nothing is as powerful as the flowing time."
  • "We are all restless guests on the Lord's ground."
  • "Alone is always the best on earth."

reception

Contemporaries:

  • "Gartenlaube" readers were appalled by the publication in 1885 and also complained about the end of the novel at Kröner . Kröner writes to the author: "The educated among our readers give the novel unreserved praise, but the great majority didn't understand you towards the end." However, Raabe did not go into the conciliatory suggestions of the "Gartenlaube" editor.
  • On May 30, 1886, Hermann Conradi compared Raabe with Jean Paul in the “Tälichen Rundschau” and found the attributes “master of witty fussiness” and “healthy, energetic writer” for the author of “restless guests”.
  • In the "Hamburger Nachrichten" of June 24, 1886, it is stated that Raabe was "busy ... painting the changing moods".
  • Contemporary critics have sometimes interpreted the novel as "Christian".

title

  • In his biographical epilogue, Hoppe goes into the two title-giving terms unrest and Säkulum . According to this, the Säkulum is the “work day of time and space-bound social existence, this in contrast to a mental and character attitude that cannot be affected by the restlessness that emanates from daily events.” The pastor and Phöbe felt “only as guests on earth and therefore tried to evade temporality. ”This attempt would only succeed Phoeba; her brother, the restless, "self-tormenting-dark" seeker of God, however, does not.

Choice of fabric

  • The novel is also a confrontation with Zola's “ Nana ” and Ibsen's “ An Enemy of the People ”. However, with consideration for the German readership, Raabe presented his Phöbe as an inverse Nana: The pastor's sister suppressed her sexuality.
  • Raabe addressed the latest results of contemporary medical research. In 1884 Gaffky succeeded in breeding the typhoid pathogen.
  • On July 14, 1860, Raabe passed an accommodation “with those suffering from lazy fever ” on a hike near Hüttenrode .
  • The health resort in the mountains is not located, but is located near Kyffhäuser . This follows necessarily from the connection between the present story (infirmary) and the " Zum wilden Mann ".

genus

  • From Raabe's extensive oeuvre, “Restless Guests” is the only work that the author has named “ Roman ”.

The more recent literary historiography has paid attention to the novel:

  • Tension arises from the contrast between “fleetingness of being a guest” and “being tied to a place or a person”. Binczek discusses Veit's futile approach to Phoebe. Raabe does not judge, but presents imponderables; in that case based on a contagious disease.
  • Sprengel ranks the novel in Raabe's works with “tendency to reject the world”. The "exclusion" of the individual by the community is described. The “discriminated” depend on the help of “independent loners”.
  • However, the protagonists are outstanding characters in the sense that society cannot destroy the strong individual.

References to further work can be found at

Fuld:

Gertrud Höhler : “Restless guests. The quotation from the Bible in Wilhelm Raabe's novel ”. 251 pages. Bonn 1969 (dissertation of November 21, 1967)

Binczek:

Karl Lorenz : "The romance novel Phöbes and Veits in the 'Restless Guests'" (1921)
Leo A. Lensing: “Naturalism, Religion and Sexuality. On the question of the argument with Zola in Wilhelm Raabe's 'Restless Guests' ”. (1988)

Oppermann:

Barker Fairley: “Wilhelm Raabe. An interpretation of his novels. ”Munich 1961, p. 143
Wilhelm Fehse: "Raabe's struggle for his novel 'Restless Guests'" (1938)
Rainer Gruenter: “One step away from the path. Spiritual local symbolism in Wilhelm Raabe's 'Restless Guests' "(1966)
Joachim Müller: "Narrative structure and symbolic structure in Wilhelm Raabe's 'Restless Guests'" (1962 and 1963).

Meyen names 25 works from the years 1891 to 1969.

expenditure

First edition

  • Restless guests. A novel from the Saekulum. 200 pages. Grote, Berlin 1886 (Grote collection, vol. 24)

Used edition

  • Restless guests . In: Karl Hoppe (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe: The selected work. Fourth volume . Aufbau-Verlag Berlin 1954, pp. 235–373 (Licensor: Hermann Klemm Publishing House, Freiburg im Breisgau)

Further editions

  • Restless guests. 200 pages. Grote, Berlin 1912 (8th edition)
  • Restless guests. 200 pages. Grote, Berlin 1919
  • Restless guests. A novel from the secular. Pp. 179–337 with an appendix by Hans Oppermann, pp. 545–571 in: Karl Hoppe (Ed.), Hans Oppermann (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe: Pfisters Mühle . Restless guests. In the old iron . (2nd edition) Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1970. Vol. 16 (without ISBN) in Karl Hoppe (Ed.), Jost Schillemeit (Ed.), Hans Oppermann (Ed.), Kurt Schreinert (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe. Complete Works. Braunschweig edition . 24 vols.
  • Restless guests. 159 pages. Elsinor-Verlag, Coesfeld 2007 (1st edition), ISBN 978-3-939483-07-6
  • Meyen lists five editions.

literature

  • Anneliese Diegeler: Wilhelm Raabe's novel 'Restless Guests' . 251 pages. Dissertation Marburg 1923. Typed
  • Hans Oppermann : Wilhelm Raabe. Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg 1970 (1988 edition), ISBN 3-499-50165-1 (rowohlt's monographs).
  • Fritz Meyen : Wilhelm Raabe. Bibliography. 2nd edition Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1973, supplementary volume. 1, ISBN 3-525-20144-3 . In: Karl Hoppe (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe. Complete Works. Braunschweig edition . 24 vols.
  • Cecilia von Studnitz : Wilhelm Raabe. Writer. A biography. 346 pages. Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf 1989, ISBN 3-7700-0778-6
  • Werner Fuld : Wilhelm Raabe. A biography. Hanser, Munich 1993 (dtv edition in July 2006), ISBN 3-423-34324-9 .
  • Peter Sprengel : History of German-Language Literature 1870–1900. From the founding of the empire to the turn of the century . CH Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-44104-1 .
  • Natalie Binczek : “'The thing has its hooks, spurs'. Imponderability of the contagion in Wilhelm Raabe's 'Restless Guests' ” . In: Heinz Ludwig Arnold (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe . Richard Boorberg Verlag Munich, October 2006, ISBN 3-88377-849-4 , pp. 75-88 (issue 172 of edition text + kritik ).
  • Eberhard Rohse : Harz tourists as literary figures in the works of Theodor Fontane and Wilhelm Raabe: "Cécile" - "Frau Salome" - "Restless guests". In: Cord-Friedrich Berghahn, Herbert Blume, Gabriele Henkel and Eberhard Rohse (eds.): Literary Harz Travel. Images and reality of a region between romanticism and modernity. Bielefeld: Verlag für Regionalgeschichte 2008 (= Braunschweiger Contributions to German Language and Literature, Vol. 10), pp. 175-231, ISBN 978-3-89534-680-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hoppe explains "Säkulum (Latin) the earthly world in its time-boundness." (Edition used, p. 728 below, entry 235). According to Meyer's Grosse Konversations-Lexikon , Raabe could also have meant “civil society” by Säkulum.
  2. ↑ Hoppe in the edition used, p. 728, 14. Zvo
  3. ↑ Binczek, p. 86, footnote 4
  4. ↑ von Studnitz, p. 314, entry 59
  5. ↑ Hoppe in the edition used, p. 728, 14th Zvu
  6. ↑ Anno 1900 and 1906 (Hoppe and Oppermann 1970, p. 550, 3. Zvo)
  7. ↑ The “dear old lady” Dorette Kristeller, the meanwhile 75-year-old sister of the “bankrupt” pharmacist from Raabe's “ Zum wilden Mann ”, takes care of the sick person .
  8. ↑ Edition used, p. 309, 12. Zvo
  9. ↑ Edition used, p. 312, 13. Zvo
  10. ↑ Edition used, p. 359, 20. Zvo
  11. ↑ Oppermann, p. 109, 23. Zvo
  12. ↑ Fuld, p. 112, 3rd Zvu and p. 294 below
  13. ↑ cited in Hoppe and Oppermann 1970, p. 549, 7. Zvo
  14. ↑ Oppermann, p. 109, middle
  15. ↑ cited in Hoppe and Oppermann 1970, p. 549, 12. Zvu
  16. ↑ cited in Hoppe and Oppermann 1970, p. 549, 14. Zvo
  17. ^ Fuld, p. 291, 14th Zvu
  18. ↑ Hoppe in the edition used, p. 768, 17. Zvo
  19. ^ Fuld, p. 291, 7th Zvu
  20. ↑ Fuld, p. 292, 8th Zvu
  21. ↑ Binczek, p. 88, footnote 59
  22. ↑ Fuld, p. 148, p. 3. Zvo
  23. ↑ Joachim Pfeiffer: "Death and Telling". Tübingen 1997, p. 86, cited in Binczek, p. 86, footnote 5
  24. ↑ Binczek, p. 82, 2. Zvo
  25. ↑ Binczek, p. 82 below - p. 83
  26. ↑ Binczek, p. 85 below - p. 86 above
  27. ^ Sprengel, p. 63, 3rd Zvu
  28. ^ Sprengel, p. 328, 10th Zvu
  29. ↑ Oppermann, p. 109 middle
  30. ↑ Fuld, p. 376, 7. Zvo
  31. ↑ Binczek, p. 87 below, footnote 52
  32. ↑ Oppermann, p. 153, 19. Zvo
  33. ↑ Meyen, pp. 382-384
  34. ↑ Additional editions appeared, for example, in 1919 (9th edition, 200 pages) and 1944 (219 pages).
  35. ↑ Meyen, pp. 126-127