Schaffner, Jakob (Basel, 1875-1944, Strasburg), came of humble stock, and was apprenticed to a shoemaker. He then led a vagrant existence in western Europe. He absorbed the works of Nietzsche and Dostoevsky and also read a great deal of Gottfried Keller, whose writings he emulated in some degree, though his stormy characters, alternating between exultation and despair, derive from the other two models. The greater part of Schaffner's mature life was spent in Berlin. His best-known early novel is Konrad Pilater (1910), in which a young man is torn between political radicalism and love. He abandons the girl the night before the wedding, but she follows him and dies on their wanderings. Pilater then submerges his identity in the anonymous world of modern industry. Schaffner's most ambitious work is a sequence of autobiographical novels tracing the development to maturity of the Swiss shoemaker's apprentice Johannes Schattenhold. The four novels, which form a protracted Bildungsroman, are Johannes (1922), Die Jünglingszeit des Johannes Schattenhold (1930), Eine deutsche Wanderschaft (1933), and Kampf und Reife (1939). After many false starts and a period as a musician, Johannes finally becomes a writer.
Schaffner published two collections of poetry (Der Kreislauf, 1917, and Bekenntnisse, 1940) and a history of Switzerland (Geschichte der Schweizer Eidgenossenschaft, 1915). Gesammelte Werke (6 vols.) appeared in 1925. Schaffner was killed in an air raid.
Jakob Schaffner
| German Literature Companion: Jakob Schaffner |
| Wikipedia: Jakob Schaffner |
Jakob Schaffner (November 14, 1875—September 23, 1944) was a leading Swiss novelist who became a supporter of Nazism.
Born on 14 November 1875 in Basel, his father died at an early age before his mother emigrated to the United States, leaving him to be reared in an orphanage. His early experiences inspired his most celebrated novel Johannes (sometimes known as Roman einer Jugend), which was published in 1922 and was a semi-autobiographical story of life in an orphanage.
As an adult Schaffner moved to Germany and was driven by his German ethnic identity. He believed that Germany had a special mission to lead the world and as such rejoiced at the coming to power of Adolf Hitler in 1933. He would go on to join the Nazi Party and work as a propagandist for Joseph Goebbels. He rarely returned to Switzerland, except for a private audience with cabinet minister Marcel Pilet-Golaz in 1940. He also endorsed the policies of the National Front in his homeland.
He was killed in 1944 during an air raid on Berlin and was buried in his hometown.
Literary Works
- Irrfahrten (Wanderings) 1905
- Die Laterne und andere Novellen (The Lantern and other novellas) 1907
- Konrad Pilater 1910
- Der Bote Gottes (The Messenger of God) 1911
- Die goldene Fratze (The Golden Fratze - a German term for a distorted or ugly face or grimace) 1912
- Die Irrfahrten des Jonathan Bregger (The Wanderings of Jonathan Bregger) 1912
- Die Weisheit der Liebe (The Wisdom of Love) 1919
- Konrad Pilater (new version) 1922
- Johannes 1922
- Brüder (Brothers) 1925
- Das grosse Erlebnis (The Grand Experience) 1926
- Die Jünglingszeit des Johannes Schattenhold (The Young Manhood of Johannes Schattenhold) 1930 (sequel to Johannes)
- Eine deutsche Wanderschaft (A German Journey) 1933 (third Johannes book)
- Offenbarung in deutscher Landschaft. Eine Sommerfahrt (Revealing in German Landscape - A Summer Journey) 1934
- Berge, Ströme und Städte. Eine schweizerische Heimatschau (Mountains, Rivers and Cities - A Swiss Homeland Show) 1938
- Kampf und Reise (Struggle and Journey) 1939 (final part of Johannes tetralogy)
External links
- Biography of Schaffner
- Shorter biography and list of books
- Nazism in Switzerland
- Propaganda work by Schaffner
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Mentioned in
- Swiss literature (literature, Switzerland)
- Schaffner
- Rolf Henne
- Eidgenössische Sammlung
