7.48 Fontane — «Der Stechlin» (chapter 1) — Epoché
What you will be able to do Read the first chapter of Theodor Fontane's last novel, Der Stechlin (1898), complete: a lake that answers the great events of the world, an old Prussian nobleman, his servant, and a telegram. Follow Fontane's ironic narrator and the voices of his characters: the aristocrat, the servant, the Jewish merchant and his son. Hear the spoken German of Brandenburg around 1895: Nu , is for ist , funfzig , dod for tot . Recognise the novel of conversation, in which talk matters more than plot. Sentences from this text, before the notes. Read the German aloud; all of them come back below. German English Er hatte noch ganz das eigentümlich sympathisch berührende Selbstgefühl all derer, He still had all the peculiarly likeable self-esteem of all those halb aus Ordnungssinn und halb aus ästhetischer Rücksicht. partly from a sense of order and partly from aesthetic considerations. das alte Schloß in andern Besitz und nun gar in einen solchen übergehen zu sehen, war ihr unerträglich. to see the old castle pass into other hands, and into such hands at that, was unbearable to her. Wenig mehr als ein Jahr vor Ausbruch des vierundsechziger Kriegs war ihm ein Sohn geboren worden, A little more than a year before the outbreak of the war of 1864 a son had been born to him, und kaum wieder in seine Garnison Brandenburg eingerückt, nahm er den Abschied, and hardly back in his garrison at Brandenburg, he resigned his commission, nichts von Umgang besaß als seinen Pastor Lorenzen (den früheren Erzieher Woldemars) und seinen Küster und Dorfschullehrer Krippenstapel, had no company but his pastor Lorenzen (Woldemar's former tutor) and his sexton and village schoolmaster Krippenstapel, Prerequisites : 7.47 — you need the history of the period from 5.24 Vocabulary . About this text Theodor Fontane (1819–1898) was a pharmacist, journalist and theatre critic before he wrote, in his sixties and seventies, the novels that made him the great realist of German literature, among them Effi Briest , which you met in 11.7 Background . Der Stechlin was his last novel. It appeared in a magazine in 1897 and as a book in 1898, shortly after his death. Fontane himself summed up its plot: an old man dies at the end, and two young people marry. Everything else is conversation, about Prussia, the nobility, the new Social Democrats, religion, and the passing of an old world. The text here is the first chapter, complete, about 3,300 words, from the second edition (Berlin, 1899) in the transcription of German Wikisource. It begins with the lake that gives the novel its name. Then it introduces Dubslav von Stechlin, a retired major in his sixties, a widower for thirty years, who owns the manor by the lake, has little money and enjoys talking. In the last part his servant Engelke brings a telegram: his son Woldemar, an officer in Berlin, is coming that evening with two friends. Fontane shows Dubslav's dependence on Baruch Hirschfeld, a Jewish draper in the nearby town who lends him money, and the arguments between Baruch and his son Isidor about the old nobleman. The portrayal uses the speech and some of the stereotypes of Fontane's time, and it should be read with that in mind. Grammar in the text The ironic narrator. Fontane's narrator likes his characters and smiles at them. Dubslav is introduced as der Typus eines Märkischen von Adel, aber von der milderen Observanz, eines jener erquicklichen Originale, bei denen sich selbst die Schwächen in Vorzüge verwandeln . The long sentence praises and teases at the same time. Spoken German. In the dialogue, Dubslav and Engelke speak as people spoke in Brandenburg: Nu, gewiß, gewiß ; das is ja so gut wie doppelt ; funfzig for fünfzig ; ’n Telegramm for ein Telegramm ; dod for tot . The narrator, by contrast, writes careful standard prose, though he too uses the northern colloquial griente for grinste : Engelke griente. Old spellings. The edition of 1899 writes giebt , thun , That and Seeen , and uses the apostrophe freely: wenn’s , gnäd’ger Herr . A symbol at the start. The lake Stechlin, the narrator says, is connected with the whole world: when volcanoes erupt in Iceland or Java, a jet of water rises from it, and at great events (the locals say wie vor hundert Jahren in Lissabon , meaning the earthquake of 1755) a red rooster rises and crows across the land. The quiet, remote place and the great world belong together, as the novel will show. Reading it a second time, section by section The lake (paragraphs 1–2). In the north of the county of Ruppin lies the lake Stechlin among old beech woods, quiet and remote, but linked to the great events of the world. The place (paragraphs 3–7). The forest, the village and the manor house are also called Stechlin. The old castle is gone; the present house is a yellow-washed building with a high roof. Dubslav (paragraphs 8–10). Dubslav von Stechlin, retired major, is a likeable original who enjoys contradiction and believes there are no unchallengeable truths, and if there are, they are boring. He served in the cuirassiers without seeing action, lost his wife a year after their happiest days began, and never married again: he jokes that he would not like to arrive in heaven with one wife on each arm. Money and family (paragraphs 11–17). Dubslav has always had money worries and depends on Baruch Hirschfeld, who is fond of him and is criticised for it by his son Isidor, a man for the new times. Dubslav's older sister Adelheid, the prioress of the convent of Wutz, helps with money too, but brother and sister have grown apart; she loves only her godson, Woldemar. Engelke, Dubslav's servant for almost fifty years, is his confidant. The telegram (paragraphs 18–38). On a fine autumn day, the third of October, Engelke brings a telegram: Woldemar will arrive at six with his friends Rex and von Czako. Dubslav and Engelke plan the supper and the guests to invite, the Gundermanns, the Katzlers and the pastor, in a conversation full of small j