Peter Schlemihl
Peter Schlemihls wondrous story is a fairy tale of the poet and naturalist Adelbert von Chamisso (1781-1838), written in the summer of 1813. It is the story of a man who has no own shadow.
Formation
On the origin of the story reported Chamisso himself:
" World events in 1813, where I was not allowed to take active part - I had no longer a country, or even no country - torn me repeatedly varied, without distracting me from my path. I wrote this summer in order to distract myself and to amuse the children of a friend, the fairy tale Schlemihl that is favorably received in Germany and became popular in England. "
The "world events ", alluding to the Chamisso, were the wars of liberation against Napoleon, in which he was unable to attend as living in Prussia was born in France.
Content
After an exhausting voyage Schlemihl learns the wealthy merchant John Thomas know in whose garden he meets a strange gray Lord. This offers him in exchange for his shadow, a purse full of gold, which never runs dry. Schlemihl agrees to the trade.
He soon realizes that this means the exclusion from human society. Once people realize that he has no shadow, they get scared and stay away from him or mock him. He therefore travels through the mountains to a seaside resort where he set up with the help of his faithful servant Bendel so that his shadowlessness is first noticed.
Finally, however, he falls in love with the beautiful Mina, and his secret is betrayed by his second servant Rascal. Only when he gets back its shadow, Minas father tells him he must marry Mina. Since the gray man appears again. Schlemihl calls his shadow back, when revealed to him the true nature of the gray man: he is the devil, of course, calls for a very polite, the balance of interests: The devil is only willing Schlemihl return the shade if this him his own soul leaves.
Schlemihl tried to flee from him, but is caught again and again. Once again, the devil tried to persuade him by loan returns him his shadow and thus leads before his eyes, could earn as much prestige and prestige Schlemihl. This declines and finally throws the bag, which he had paid with his shadow, into an abyss. He cuts off the last volume of the devil. From the little money he buys a pair of old boots which are proving to be seven-league boots. By the end of the story he lives lonely as a naturalist.
Reception
Well on presentation of this story was subsequently a popular song ( shortened ) reproduces the story:
There once was a man by the name of Schlemihl the once spoke to a, if he does not sell him his shadow? He would soon be a rich man!
After a moment's thought, he agrees and got a pouch for wage "This little bag that is never empty ," said the gloomy shadows buyer scorn " Yes I think I did a good exchange ," says our Schlemihl then " I buy my castle and estate and yard, what I'm starting to have a shadow? "
The Lord Schlemihl, who moved into a and'res land, castle and estate and home buying and he wanted to marry then soon, a chosen one, there were already He went to his beloved house, asks "Do you take me for a husband? " "Three days to think I pray me out before I can say yes. "
But the sun seemed on its shape, and without a shadow he stood there " Never will I take thee for a husband, without a shadow you're also the soul bar" In fact, Schlemihl has sold his shadow, thereby verlor'n his soul Then you never heard from him, and no one knows more that he once were born.
Imitations, sequels, artistic realization
In ETA Hoffmann's The Adventure New Year's Eve occurs Schlemihl on as a minor character, thus clarifying the fate of the protagonist in the story of the prodigal mirror image. The latter served as a template for Jacques Offenbach's opera The Tales of Hoffmann, in which the subject of Schlemihls lost shadow is taken up and reinterpreted again. Schlemihl takes place there as a rival of the main character.
Two writers of the 19th century continue Chamisso's story of Peter Schlemihl: Friedrich Christoph Förster 1843 Schlemihl 's homecoming and Ludwig Bechstein with The manuscripts Schlemihl 's (2 parts) 1851.
Hans Christian Andersen processed in 1847, the motif of the lost shadow in his tale The Shadow.
David Kalisch used the material for a stage play: Peter Schlemihl. Farce with songs in 1 lift, which was premiered in May 1850 Theater in Berlin Friedrich- Wilhelm Municipal.
August Brunetti - Pisano composed an opera Schlemihl, which was performed in 1908 in Ludwigsburg.
The artist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner created in 1915 with a seven-part front page series on this work to his own inner conflict, in which he saw parallels to Schlemihl to express. In Kirchner's eyes the story Schlemihls is the pursuit of a madman who is suddenly aware of its infinite smallness.
The folk-rock band Ougenweide set to music the folksong with the specified text at the top of their 1976 released album treat for the ears.
Expenditure
- Baron Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué (ed.): Schlemihl 's wondrous story. Communicated by Adelbert von Chamisso. With copper as the frontispiece. Johann Leonhard Schrag, Nuremberg 1814. ( Digitized and full text in German Text Archive )
- Adelbert von Chamisso: Peter Schlemihls wondrous journey. With illustrations by Emil Preetorius. Kurt Wolff Verlag, Leipzig, 1908.
- Adelbert von Chamisso: Peter Schlemihls wondrous story. With 25 two-color illustrations by Franziska Walther. Kunstanstifter Verlag, Mannheim 2011, ISBN 978-3-942795-00-5.