Der abenteuerliche Simplicissimus Teutsch
abenteuerliche Simplicissimus Teutsch, Der, a novel by J. J. C. von Grimmelshausen, first published pseudonymously in 1669 (dated 1668) in an edition containing 5 Books. Only a few copies of this edition have survived, and the best known extant form is the second edition of 1669, to which a sixth book was added in the same year: Continuatio des abentheurlichen Simplicissimi oder Schluß desselben. Grimmelshausen himself designed the well-known copper engraving on the title-page of the edition of 1683-4; dominated by a grotesque monster displaying an open book, it is a hieroglyphic composition alluding to the novel's multifarious motifs. The edition of 1671, containing minor alterations, is the version which is usually reprinted. The long sub-title of 92 words, which sets forth the book's programme, contains the true name of Simplicissimus, Melchior Sternfels von Fuchshaim, as well as the pseudonym of the author, German Schleifheim von Sulsfort; like other pseudonyms used by Grimmelshausen, they are anagrams of his full name, and his authorship was not discovered until the 19th c. (by H. Kurz). A facsimile of the 1671 edition, entitled Des Abenteuerlichen Simplicissimus Ewig-währender Calender and commented by K. Haberkamm, appeared in 1967.
The background of Simplicissimus is the Thirty Years War (see Dreissigjähriger Krieg). Of the six books the last (Continuatio) is apparently an afterthought prompted by the immense success of the work. The action is best recounted book by book. Bk. 1: the hero, a child, whose innocence is symbolized by his name, grows up in the Spessart on the farm of his putative father. Plundering troops raid the farm and torture or rape the inhabitants. The boy flees and is sheltered by a hermit, who gives him the name Simplicius, educates him, and instructs him in religion. On the death of the hermit, Simplicius goes to Hanau. Bk. 2: in Hanau he survives an attempt to drive him insane. He is carried off by Croat soldiers from whom he escapes, and then, falling in with imperial troops, he forms a friendship with a young man called Herzbruder. Bk. 3: he becomes an efficient and daring soldier, and his exploits with his comrade Springinsfeld gain him the nickname Der Jäger von Soest, where he is stationed. Eventually he falls into Swedish captivity and has various amorous adventures, one of which leads to a forced marriage. Bk. 4: Simplicius sets out for Cologne, where he has money, but encounters difficulties in obtaining it. He next accompanies two noblemen to Paris, where he has many nocturnal exploits with fine ladies. On his return he falls ill with smallpox, and, finding himself alone and penniless on his recovery, makes his way to Germany as a doctor. Bk. 5: having met Herzbruder again, Simplicius goes with him on a pilgrimage to Einsiedeln. Herzbruder dies, Simplicius finds that his own wife has died, and makes a second, unsuccessful marriage with a country girl. He learns that he is of noble birth and that his true father was the hermit who succoured him after his escape from the marauding soldiers. His name proves to be that given on the title-page, Melchior Sternfels von Fuchshaim. After further adventures, including a visit to Moscow, he becomes convinced of the vanity of earthly things and becomes a hermit. Bk. 6: the world tempts him again; after various dangers and sufferings he is wrecked on an island in the South Atlantic, and there resumes his life as a hermit; rejecting a chance of repatriation, he ends his life there.
The novel is a work on at least four planes. It is an absorbing, racily told adventure story; at the same time it recounts the development and maturing of a character; it comments with dry irony on human affairs; and finally, it presents a view of life, a recognition of the vanity of worldly things and a resigned and half-humorous acceptance of what fortune brings. The final book, moreover, is the first Robinsonade, or ‘Robinson Crusoe story’, in German literature. The incidental character of the Landstörzerin Courasche (Bk. 5 ch. 6, but there called only ‘Landstörzerin’), to whom Grimmelshausen later devoted the novel Trutz-Simplex, is the original of Brecht's Mutter Courage in Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder. Of all the massive literature of the 17th c., Simplicissimus is one work which remains outstandingly alive. It forms the basis of Des Simplicius Simplicissimus Jugend (1948) by Karl Amadeus Hartmann (b. 1905).
