Jeremias Gotthelf
Gotthelf, Jeremias, pseudonym and now universally accepted designation of Albert Bitzius (Murten, 1797-1854, Lützelflüh nr. Berne), Swiss pastor and novelist. The son of a pastor, Gotthelf was at school in Berne, where he subsequently studied theology. After ordination in 1820 he was for a short time his father's curate at Utzenstorf, and then spent a year of further study at Göttingen University. He returned to assist his father again in 1822, but when the father died in 1824 he was, to his bitter disappointment, passed over for the living. He was next curate in Herzogenbuchsee, where his reforming temper brought him into conflict with the authorities, and in 1829 he was transferred to Berne. Two years later he was sent as curate to the remote village of Lützelflüh in the Emmental, becoming pastor there in 1832, and marrying in the following year. It was in Lützelflüh that he spent the remainder of his life and wrote his novels.
Gotthelf found his vocation as a novelist in 1836, when he wrote with great rapidity the powerful and gloomy didactic story of Swiss peasant life, Der Bauernspiegel (1837). For all his subsequent novels he used as his pseudonym the name of Jeremias Gotthelf, the principal character of this story, who purported also to be its narrator. From this time on, while still active as pastor of Lützelflüh, Gotthelf wrote and published a series of Swiss rural novels marked by strong social commitment, a vivid eye for character, detailed psychological penetration, and a concise, relaxed, and yet forceful style. Leiden und Freuden eines Schulmeisters (2 vols., 1838-9) grew out of his preoccupation with education. Wie Uli der Knecht glücklich wird (1841), a novel of back-slidings and renewed resolve, ends in achievement, and this optimistic tone persists in its belated sequel Uli der Pächter (1849).
Meanwhile Gotthelf had written the two great novels Wie Anne Bäbi Jowäger haushaltet (2 vols., 1843-4) and Geld und Geist (3 vols., 1843-4). To these he later added Der Geltstag (1845), Käthi die Großmutter (2 vols., 1847), Die Käserei in der Vehfreude (1850), Zeitgeist und Berner Geist (2 vols., 1853), and Erlebnisse eines Schuldenbauers (1853). Gotthelf was equally successful with shorter stories and Novellen, publishing the collections Bilder und Sagen aus der Schweiz (6 vols., 1842-6), Hans Joggeli der Erbvetter (1848), and Erzählungen und Bilder aus dem Volksleben der Schweiz (5 vols., 1850-5). Among the large number of impressive Novellen, best known are Die schwarze Spinne (1842 in Bilder und Sagen aus der Schweiz) and Elsi, die seltsame Magd (1843, later included in Erzählungen und Bilder).
Gotthelf's burning interest in the welfare of the peasantry prompted him also to undisguised political and social writing, of which the most notable example is the long essay Die Armennot (1840). He continued to write uninterruptedly until his death in 1854, brought about by dropsy. Although well known in his own day in Switzerland, his writings did not at first make an impact on the wider German public, though a collected edition, Gesammelte Schriften (24 vols.), was published in Berlin, 1855-8.
Gotthelf's reputation has risen rapidly in the 20th c. His avowed didactic purpose may seem at first homespun and his range of environment parochial, but his infallible sense for character, his instinctive grasp of emotion and motivation, his natural gift for story-telling, and his racy, dialect-touched style make him one of the most readable of German novelists; one who, seemingly without effort, creates a world in all its particulars.
R. Hunziker and H. Bloesch et al. edited Gesamtausgabe (24 vols. with 18 supplementary vols.,
