THE SHADOWLESS MAN |
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| INTRODUCTION | |
| AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION | |
| CHAPTER 1 | |
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| " 5 | |
THE COLD HEART |
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| INTRODUCTION | |
| PART 1 | |
| " 2 | |
In 1813 Europe was busy watching the career of the Corsican Giant--which was nearing its end. Having reached the summit of power, and put his foot on the neck of Europe, Napoleon was suddenly hurled down from his dizzy height. And yet in the midst of stirring events and the din of arms, people found time to pay attention to important literary productions. A curious book, "The Strange Narrative of Peter Schlemihl," by Louis Adelbert von Chamisso, which made its first appearance in Germany in 1813, aroused an ever increasing interest, in spite of the distraction of the public mind, until the name of the author became world-famous.
Chamisso was by birth a Frenchman, having been born at the castle of Bon-Court in Champagne, on January 27, 1781.1 On the outbreak of the French Revolution our author left France with his parents; and in 1795 we find them in Bayreuth, which then belonged to the King of Prussia, the Margrave of Anspach having sold the town to his Prussian Majesty in 1791. Chamisso's parents at last came to Berlin, and young Adelbert was appointed page to Queen Louise. This famous queen, wife of Frederic William II. and mother of Frederic William III., took a lively interest in the young page and decided to complete his somewhat neglected education. A commission in the army was secured for him, he was made ensign and soon afterwards lieutenant. Napoleon having in the meantime become First Consul, he recalled the French emigrants, and Chamisso's parents availed themselves of the permission and returned to their home, but they nevertheless advised their son to remain in Prussian service. Adelbert obeyed them, although he felt far from happy in Berlin. The service of page did not please him, and his correspondence is full of passages revealing the melancholy state of his mind. The court atmosphere was stifling him, and his poverty caused him a great deal of humiliation. We see him, at that time, as a young man of a serious and independent disposition, a dreamer and a sceptic, timid and naive, dissatisfied with his position as page and as soldier, unhappy in his exile, his misery and his solitude!
But at last Chamisso found consolation in work. With great ardour he applied himself to the study of the German language and literature, and particularly to poetry and philosophy. He learned Greek, and the Iliad became his constant companion. Klopstock and Schiller attracted him greatly; but he also read J. J. Rousseau, Voltaire and Diderot. He published several poems in the language of his adopted country, compositions distinguished by an originality of style and a peculiar vigour. Chamisso's first work is supposed to have been "The Count de Comminges," written in 1801 or 1802. It is not an original work, but rather an imitation or translation of a drama from the pen of Baculard d'Arnaud, produced in 1790. Later on he read Wieland and Goethe, and in 1803 appeared his Faust, in which the influence of the philosophy of Fichte made itself felt. It was also in this year that love, by the side of poetry and metaphysics, occupied the mind and heart of the young lieutenant. Chamisso fell in love with Madame Cérès Duvernay, a young French coquette widow, of whom--unlike Sam Weller--he did not learn to beware. He had made her acquaintance in the salon of the banker Ephraim, and asked her to marry him. Madame Duvernay, however, was a practical Frenchwoman and refused the legitimate love of the poor lieutenant! This love affair and its sad ending increased Chamisso's melancholy and his inclination for solitude. The war with France then broke out, and Chamisso tasted the bitterness which is so often the lot of that unhappy product of modern civilization and political circumstances: the naturalized alien! He found himself in an anomalous position which caused him great distress, for it isolated him among many millions. Although a naturalized German, nay, at heart attached to Germany and animated--like so many of his confrères--by the spirit of liberty--he was nevertheless of French parentage. It was not only a question whether he should take up arms on behalf of Germany, but also, whether he should fight against France and the people with whom he was connected by ties of blood and family relationship. Hence arose a struggle in his breast. "I, and I alone," he exclaimed in his despair, "am forbidden at this juncture to wield a sword!" Very few people understand the tragedy of those exiles who are compelled to seek a new home and adopt a new country which they love as much, if not more, than the people among whom they have come to dwell. Instead of meeting with sympathy on account of his peculiar situation, Chamisso was frequently doomed to hear, in the Capital of Prussia, the headquarters of the confederation against France and Napoleon, expressions of hatred and scorn directed against his countrymen. He was himself too fair-minded to mistake the cause of such expressions, which were, after all, only natural in the circumstances, but they nevertheless deeply hurt the sensitive poet when they reached his ears.
After the treaty of Tilsit had been signed by Napoleon and the King of Prussia, Chamisso visited France, where his family regained possession of part of their estates, and our author secured, for a short time, the post of professor at the school at Napoléonville in the Vendée. It was during his stay in France that Chamisso was drawn into the circle of Madame de Stael, and he followed her to Coppet, where she had been exiled by Napoleon in 1811. In the house of this "magnificent and wonderful woman," as he calls her in his letters, he passed incomparable days in the company of August Wilhelm von Schlegel, Madame Récamier and other celebrities. It was also then that he began to study botany on the advice of an English friend. Soon, however, Chamisso returned to Berlin, which was to him what Delphi once was to the ancient Athenians. He continued his botanical studies and at the age of 31 entered the University as a student of medicine. Again the war broke out, and the uprising of the Germans against Napoleon involved Chamisso once more in the popular hatred against the French. Anyone who lays claim to some historical knowledge and a dash of culture is acquainted with the events of 1813. A wave of patriotic enthusiasm swept over Germany, and Germans rose like one man, in answer to the appeal of Frederic William, King of Prussia. Houses, streets and universities resounded with the clash of arms and the shouts of war-like patriots. In the midst of this effervescence Chamisso suffered greatly. He loved Germany and liberty, but he also cherished France, his native land; moreover, he could not help admiring Napoleon, in spite of the latter's tyranny. While the German poets Koerner and Eichendorff took up arms, while Arndt, Rückert and Uhland fired the courage of their compatriots by their warlike songs, Chamisso not only stood alone, but was even exposed to danger. His friends therefore decided to remove him from Berlin. Lichtenstein, his professor at the University, found him a position as teacher in the family of Count Itzenplitz, where he taught French and botany. He was sufficiently near to the capital to be kept acquainted with the gradual development of the all-important crisis, and yet remained free from any unpleasant personal contact with it! Here, at Kunnersdorf, the family seat of Count Itzenplitz, scarcely a day's journey from Berlin, while occupied with the study of botany and other sciences, Chamisso conceived the idea of "The Shadowless Man," and with rapid pen completed the story.
One day, to divert himself and to amuse the wife and children of his friend Hitzig, whom Heine calls Der Dekan der Schlemihle, he wrote Peter Schlemihl.
In 1814, this wonderful narrative was brought to the notice of Baron de la Motte Fouqué, the celebrated author of Undine, under whose auspices the book was published with the following letter from de la Motte Fouqué to Julius Edward Hitzig, by way of introduction:--
We should take care, my dear Edward, not to expose the history of poor Schlemihl to eyes unfit to look upon it. That would be a bad experiment. Of such eyes there are plenty; and who is able to predict what may befall a manuscript, which is almost more difficult to guard than spoken language? Like a person seized with vertigo, therefore, who, in the paroxysm of his feelings, leaps into the abyss, I commit the story to the press.
And yet there are better and more serious reasons for the step I have taken. If I am not wholly deceived, there are in our dear Germany many hearts both capable and worthy of comprehending poor Schlemihl, although a smile will arise on the countenance of many among our honest countrymen at the bitter sport which was death to him and to the innocent being whom he drew along with him. And you, Edward, when you have seen the estimable work and reflected on the number of unknown and sympathising bosoms who, with ourselves, will learn to love it,--you will then, perhaps, feel that some drops of consolation have been instilled into those wounds inflicted on you, and on all who love you, by death.
To conclude: I have become convinced, by repeated experience, that a guardian angel watches over books, places them in proper hands, and if not always, yet often, prevents them from falling into improper. In any case, he exercises an invisible guardianship over every work of true genius and genuine feeling, and with unfailing tact and skill opens or shuts its pages as he sees fit.
To this guardian angel I commit our Schlemihl. And so, adieu!
Neunhausen, May 1814.
FOUQUÉ.
Some of the incidents of the wonderful story of "The Shadowless Man" were suggested by actual experiences of its author; and it is remarkable that in the latter part of the narrative Chamisso should have anticipated his own voyage round the world.
Chamisso was often pestered with questions respecting what he really meant by the story of Schlemihl. These questions amused as well as annoyed him. The truth is, that his intention in writing it was perhaps scarcely of so precise a nature as to admit of his giving a formal account of it. The story sprang into being of itself, like every work of genius, prompted by a self-creating power. In a letter which he wrote to Trinius, Councillor at St. Petersburg in 1829, Chamisso says: "When I write I rarely have anything in view; I am, if you like, a nightingale, a singing bird, and not a reasoning man." And when he had just commenced the book he wrote to Hitzig as follows: "A book was the last thing you would have expected from me! Place it before your wife this evening, if you have time; should she be desirous to know Schlemihl's further adventures, and particularly who the man in the grey cloak is--send me back the MS. immediately, that I may continue the story; but if you do not return it, I shall know the meaning of the signal perfectly." "One day," Chamisso further relates, "I had lost my hat, portmanteau, gloves and all my luggage, and Fouqué asked me jestingly whether I had also lost my shadow. We then amused ourselves imagining such a calamity. I conceived the idea of Peter Schlemihl, and as I had leisure in the country I wrote the story."
In the preface to a French translation (which appeared in 1838) of this story, Chamisso amuses himself over the prying curiosity of those who want to know what was his real object in writing this tale:--"The present story," he says, "has fallen into the hands of thoughtful people, who, being accustomed to read only for instruction's sake, have been at a loss to know what the shadow signifies. On this point several have formed curious hypotheses; others, who do me the honour to believe that I am more learned than I really am, have addressed themselves to me for the solution of their doubts. The questions with which they have besieged me have made me blush on account of my ignorance. I have therefore been induced to devote myself to the investigation of a matter not hitherto the subject of my studies; and I now beg to submit to the world the result of my learned researches:
"'Concerning Shadows.--A dark body can only be partially illuminated by a bright one. The dark space which lies in the direction of the un-illuminated part is what we call a shadow. Properly speaking, shadow signifies a bodily space, the form of which depends upon the form of the illuminating body, and upon their opposite position with regard to each other. The shadow thrown on a surface situated before the shadow-projecting body is therefore nothing else than the intersection of this surface by the bodily space [in French, le solide, on which word solid the whole force of the humour turns], which we before designated by the word shadow.'
"The question in this wonderful history of Peter Schlemihl relates entirely to the last-mentioned quality, solidity. The science of finance instructs us sufficiently as to the value of money: the value of a shadow is less generally acknowledged. My thoughtless friend was covetous of money, of which he knew the value, and forgot to think of solid substance. It was his wish that the lesson which he had paid for so dearly should be turned to our profit; and his bitter experience calls to us with a loud voice. Think of the solid--the substantial!"
In Peter Schlemihl, it is practically admitted by all literary critics, Chamisso drew his own portrait, not only with regard to external appearance but also in a moral sense. He is supposed to have described his own sufferings, the sufferings of a man who has lost his fatherland and nationality, and is an exile. Peter Schlemihl, the shadowless man, at last finds consolation and reconciliation in wandering over the face of earth. Here again the author mirrors his own yearning in a moment when--in the tumult of war--he, a German Frenchman or a French German, finds no proper place in countries limited by political boundaries. He strove therefore to rise above the quarrels of the human race and to wander forth into the vast space of nature, or plunge into the depths of science! His dream soon became realised, when he found himself on board the Rurik. It was in the early part of 1815 when Chamisso gladly accepted the invitation of Count Roumyanzov to accompany the latter on a voyage round the world. The ships left Kronstadt in 1815, and returned in 1818, and although the discovery of a north-west passage--the object of the expedition--was not accomplished, yet extensive acquisitions were made in every department of scientific research.
Chamisso's share in the voyage is recorded in the third volume of the account of it published at Weimar in 1821, and does honour to his spirit of careful observation and his accuracy. Like Darwin after him, Chamisso has related his experiences interspersed with scientific observations. He now again fixed his residence at Berlin, from which University he received the degree of Doctor in Philosophy. An appointment at the Botanic Gardens allowed him full liberty to follow up his favourite pursuit of Natural History, and bound him by still stronger ties to his second fatherland. He soon married Antonie Piaste, a relation of Hitzig. Chamisso then wrote an account of the principal plants of the north of Germany, with views respecting the vegetable kingdom, and science of Botany; this work appeared at Berlin in 1827. Poetry, however, had still some share of his attention; and he continued, during the latter years of his life, to maintain his claims to an honourable place among the poets of Germany. In 1829 he published his famous work "Salas y Gomez." Several of his ballads and romances rank with the most distinguished of modern times in this branch of composition. With regard to the story before us, the narrative of Peter Schlemihl, it is in any case very original. At once comic and tragic, grotesque and terrible, it is full of gaiety and emotion, and the supernatural, phantastic and absurd are skillfully mixed with natural and real elements. From the world which we inhabit the author leads us into the realm of mystery--and yet, while we experience sensations of the marvellous, we do not seem to leave the world of reality. And herein lies the difference between Peter Schlemihl and other tales of the period. In Tieck and Arnim the fairy and real worlds are opposed and hostile to each other, in Fouqué's Undine these elements are reconciled, but the events are laid in the middle-ages, when people believed in fairies. Chamisso, however, wields into one the supernatural and the real and writes a fable in accordance with modern civilization! Of course, Chamisso cannot be compared with Ariosto and The Thousand and One Nights,--where we find logic even in the domain of the impossible. Chamisso, it must further be pointed out, while possessing all the qualities of the Romanticists, is free from their obscurities. His nationally dual nature and his peculiar poetic gifts enabled him to give expression in poetry to the variegated manifestations of science and of art. He contributed greatly to the unification of the national German and foreign elements, and was one of the most useful and productive workers in the lovely garden of fairy tales. Surrounded by a circle of admiring friends, Chamisso continued his literary work until his death in 1839.
A. S. RAPPOPORT.
Berck-Plage,
September, 1913.
Footnote 1: From certain passages in Chamisso's works it appears, however, that he was born on January 31st.--Cf. Brun X., A. de Chamisso's de Boncourt, Lyon, 1895, p. 4.
"An extraordinary looking old man left me these papers,
saying he came from Berlin."
You, who forget nobody, must surely remember one Peter Schlemihl, whom you used to meet occasionally at my house,--a long-legged youth, who was considered stupid and lazy, on account of his awkward and careless air. I was sincerely attached to him. You cannot have forgotten him, Edward. He was, on one occasion, the hero of our rhymes, in the hey-day of our youthful spirits; and I recollect taking him one evening to a poetical tea-party, where he fell asleep while I was writing, without even waiting to hear my effusion: and this reminds me of a witticism of yours respecting him. You had already seen him, I know not where or when, in an old black frock-coat, which indeed, he constantly wore; and you said, "He would be a lucky fellow if his soul were half as immortal as his coat,"--so little opinion had you of him. I loved him, however: and to this very Schlemihl, of whom for many years I had wholly lost sight, I am indebted for the little volume which I communicate to you, Edward, my most intimate friend, my second self, from whom I have no secrets;--to you, and of course our Fouqué, I commit them, who, like you, is intimately entwined about my dearest affections,--to him I communicate them only as a friend, but not as a poet; for you can easily imagine how unpleasant it would be if a secret confided to me by an honest man, relying implicitly on my friendship and honour, were to be exposed to the public in a poem.
One word more as to the manner in which I obtained these sheets; yesterday morning early, as soon as I was up, they were brought to me. An extraordinary-looking man, with a long grey beard, and wearing an old black frock-coat, with a botanical case hanging at his side and slippers over his boots, in the damp, rainy weather, had just been inquiring for me, and left me these papers, saying he came from Berlin.
ADELBERT VON CHAMISSO.
After a prosperous, but to me very wearisome, voyage, we came at last into port. Immediately on landing, I got together my few effects; and, squeezing myself through the crowd, went into the nearest and humblest inn which first met my gaze. On asking for a room, the waiter looked at me from head to foot, and conducted me to one. I asked for some cold water, and for the correct address of Mr. Thomas John, which was described as being "by the north gate, the first country-house to the right, a large new house of red and white marble, with many pillars." This was enough. As the day was not far advanced, I untied my bundle, took out my newly-turned black coat, dressed myself in my best clothes, and, with my letter of recommendation, set out for the man who was to assist me in the attainment of my moderate wishes.
After proceeding up North Street, I reached the gate, and saw the marble columns glittering through the trees. Having wiped the dust from my shoes with my pocket-handkerchief, and re-adjusted my cravat, I rang the bell--offering up, at the same time, a silent prayer. The door flew open; and the porter sent in my name. I had soon the honour to be invited into the park, where Mr. John was walking with a few friends. I recognised him at once by his corpulency and self-complacent air. He received me very well; just as a rich man receives a poor devil; and, turning to me, took my letter.
"Oh, from my brother! It is a long time since I heard from him, is he well?--Yonder," he went on, turning to the company, and pointing to a distant hill--"Yonder is the site of the new building." He broke the seal without discontinuing the conversation, which turned upon riches. "The man," he said, "who does not possess at least a million is a poor wretch."
"O how true!" I exclaimed, in the fulness of my heart.
He seemed pleased at this, and replied with a smile, "Stop here, my dear friend; afterwards I shall, perhaps, have time to tell you what I think of this," pointing to the letter, which he then put into his pocket, and turned round to the company, offering his arm to a young lady. His example was followed by the other gentlemen, each politely escorting a lady; and the whole party proceeded towards a little hill thickly planted with blooming roses.
I followed without troubling any one, for none took the least further notice of me. The party were in high spirits--lounging about and jesting--speaking sometimes of trifling matters very seriously, and of serious matters as triflingly--and exercising their wit in particular to great advantage on their absent friends and their affairs. I was too ignorant of what they were talking about to understand much of it, and too anxious and absorbed in my own reflections to occupy myself with the solution of such enigmas as their conversation presented.