Jakob Wassermann

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The German author Jakob Wassermann (1873-1934) combined a romanticized psychoanalysis with an almost journalistic sensationalism. He used a narrative technique that verged at times on the surrealistic and was heavily laden with symbol and constructed myth.

Jakob Wassermann was born on March 10, 1873, in Fürth, the son of a Jewish merchant. After a childhood with many restrictions, he began his career as an office clerk, in Munich and then in Freiburg. In 1898 he moved to Vienna and eventually established himself as a writer. Derivative and imitative, Wassermann's novels showed from the outset a strong dependence upon Fyodor Dostoevsky - particularly in his fondness for the psychological probing of criminals and social outcasts - as well as the influence of the master of the romantic horror and detective story, E. T. A. Hoffmann.

Wassermann's first significant work is Die Juden von Zirndorf (1897; The Jews of Zirndorf), in which his deep knowledge of his own community in Fürth and Nuremberg stands him in good stead. As in many of his other works, Wassermann's preoccupation with innocence and redemption is here interleaved with a somewhat crass depiction of depravity and superstition. Der Moloch (1902) pays tribute to the contemporary literary cult of the great city (here Vienna), seen as an all-devouring monster of sin and perversion. Caspar Hauser (1908) is probably the author's best novel; the book, based on fact, deals with the case of the mute youth who appeared one day in 1828 on the streets of Nuremberg. Resemblances to Dostoevsky's The Idiot may also be noted in this tale of the rejection and contamination of innate purity by corrupt society.

After Caspar Hauser Wassermann's novels and short stories become increasingly preoccupied with bizarre and perverse anecdotes and intrigue, often initially drawn from biography or the newspapers. Das Gänsemännchen (1915; The Goose Man) illuminates the problem involved in simultaneous cohabitation with two wives. Christian Wahnschaffe (1919) exploits the theme of the rich man's son who rejects the world to turn toward Buddhism. Der Fall Maurizius (1928; The Mauritius Case) is a type of detective novel made colorful by excursions into hypnosis but also weighed down by a tedious mass of psychological dissection. Like Honoré de Balzac, whom he imitated, Wassermann introduces the same characters into different novels; thus Etzel Andergast (1931) is a sequel to The Mauritius Case, and its hero, Joseph Kerkhoven, reappears in Joseph Kerkhovens dritte Existenz (1934; Joseph Kerkhoven's Third Existence).

Wassermann is a somewhat uneven and labored writer, and he cannot in any sense be considered a stylist. His novels are often marred by diffuseness and miasmic obscurity. At the same time his extensive output is of considerable historical interest and illuminates rather well the consequences of marriage between the new depth psychology and the popular novel of sensation and crime. He died on Jan. 1, 1934, in Alt-Aussee.

Further Reading

The standard study in English is John C. Blankenagel, The Writings of Jakob Wassermann (1942). A penetrating account of Wassermann, placing him in his tradition and period, is also in Jethro Bithell, Modern German Literature (1939; 3d ed. 1959).

Wassermann, Jakob (Fürth, Nuremberg, 1873-1934, Alt-Aussee, Austria), after beginning a career in business, turned to journalism, working for a time on the editorial staff of Simplicissimus in Munich. In 1898 he moved to Vienna. For nearly forty years he was a successful novelist, popular both at home and abroad.

Die Juden von Zirndorf (1897) was followed by Die Geschichte der jungen Renate Fuchs (1900), a novel of self-emancipation; Der Moloch (1902, revised 1921), in which the central character, Arnold Ansorge, takes his own life because he cannot accommodate himself to the corruption of the metropolis; Alexander in Babylon (1905), a historical novel; Caspar Hauser (1908); Die Masken Erwin Reiners (1910); Der Mann von vierzig Jahren (1913); Das Gänsemännchen (1915); Christian Wahnschaffe (1919, 2 vols.); Laudin und die Seinen (1925); Der Fall Maurizius (1928); Etzel Andergast (1931); and Joseph Kerkhovens dritte Existenz (1934). His collections of Novellen include Schläfst du, Mutter (1897), Der niegeküßte Mund (1903), Die Schwestern (1906), Der gol-dene Spiegel (1911), and Der Wendekreis (4 vols., 1920-4); a posthumous novel, Olivia, appeared in 1937.

Wassermann, who profited by the theories of S. Freud, was an acute psychological observer. He wrote a number of essays (including Die Kunst der Erzählung, 1904, Imaginäre Brücken, 1921, Lebensdienst, 1928, Hofmannsthal, der Freund, 1930, and Reden an die Jugend über das Leben im Geiste, 1932) and biographies of Columbus (1929) and H. M. Stanley (1932). By his residence in Austria and his early death Wassermann escaped anti-Semitic persecution, but his autobiographical essay Mein Weg als Deutscher und Jude (1921) emphasizes his awareness of the problem. A penetrating self-analysis is contained in Engelhardt oder Die zwei Welten, the title given to a novel written in 1905 but withheld from publication during Wassermann's own lifetime and that of his second wife (died 1965); it was published after the discovery of the MS. in 1973.

Gesammelte Werke (7 vols.) appeared 1944-8; correspondence, Briefe an Julie Wassermann 1900-1929 in 1940, Geliebtes Herz, ed. A. Berauck, in 1948; Tagebuch aus dem Winkel. Erzählungen und Aufsätze aus dem Nachlaß in 1933 (reissued in 1987); Deutscher und Jude. Reden und Schriften 1904-1933, ed. D. Rodewald, in 1984.

Jakob Wassermann
Jakob Wassermann, by Emil Orlik
Born	March 10, 1873(1873-03-10) Fürth
Died	January 1, 1934 (aged 60)
Nationality	German
Religious beliefs	Jewish

Jakob Wassermann (March 10, 1873 - January 1, 1934) was a Jewish-German writer and novelist.

Contents 1 Life 2 Works 3 References 4 External links

Life

Born in Fürth, Wassermann was the son of a shopkeeper and lost his mother at an early age. He showed literary interest early and published various pieces in small newspapers. Because his father was reluctant to support his literary ambitions, he began a short-lived apprenticeship with a businessman in Vienna after graduation.

He completed his military service in Nuremberg. Afterward, he stayed in southern Germany and in Switzerland. In 1894 he moved to Munich. Here he worked as a secretary and later as a copy editor at the paper Simplicissimus. Around this time he also became acquainted with other writers Rainer Maria Rilke, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and Thomas Mann.

In 1896 he released his first novel, Melusine. Interestingly, his last name (Wassermann) means "water-man" in German; a "Melusine" (or "Melusina") is a figure of European legends and folklore, a feminine spirit of fresh waters in sacred springs and rivers.

From 1898 he was a theater critic in Vienna. In 1901 he married Julie Speyer, whom he divorced in 1915. Three years later he was married again to Marta Karlweis.

After 1906, he lived alternatively in Vienna or at Altaussee in der Steiermark where he died in 1934 after a severe illness.

In 1926, he was elected to the Prussian Academy of Art. He resigned in 1933, narrowly avoiding an expulsion by the Nazis. In the same year, his books were banned in Germany owing to his Jewish ancestry.

Wassermann's work includes poetry, essays, novels, and short stories. His most important works are considered the novel Der Fall Maurizius (1928) and the autobiography, My Life as German and Jew (Mein Weg als Deutscher und Jude) (1921), in which he discussed the tense relationship between his German and Jewish identities.^[1]

Works

• Melusine (Novel, 1896)
• The Dark Pilgrimage (Die Juden von Zirndorf) (Novel, 1897)
• Die Geschichte der jungen Renate Fuchs (Novel, 1900)
• Der Moloch (Novel, 1902)
• Der niegeküsste Mund (Stories, 1903)
• Kunst der Erzählung (Essay, 1904)
• Alexander von Babylon (Novel, 1905)
• Caspar Hauser oder Die Trägheit des Herzens (Novel, 1908)
• Der Mann von vierzig Jahren (Novel, 1913)
• Das Gänsemännchen (Novel, 1915)
• Christian Wahnschaffe (Novel, 1919)
• Die Prinzessin Girnara, Weltspiel und Legende (Play, 1919)
• Mein Weg als Deutscher und Jude (Autobiography, 1921)
• Laudin und die Seinen (Novel, 1925)
• Das Gold von Caxamalca (Stories, 1928)
• Novel Trilogy:
  • The Maurizius Case (Der Fall Maurizius) (1928)
  • Etzel Andergast (1931)
  • Joseph Kerkhovens dritte Existenz (1934)

References

• John Carl Blankenagel: The writings of Jakob Wassermann. Boston, The Christopher publishing house, 1942.
• Henry Miller: Reflections on The Maurizius case: a humble appraisal of a great book. Santa Barbara, Calif.: Capra Press, 1974.
• Alice Cohn Hanberg: The humanism of Jakob Wassermann. Thesis-University of California. Microfilm. Los Angeles, University of California, Library Photographic Service, 1953.
• Stephen H. Garrin: The concept of justice in Jakob Wassermann’s trilogy. Bern: Lang, 1979.

1. ^ Scharfstein S: Jewish History and You. Jersey City, New Jersey: Ktav Publishing House, page 123. Accessed 2008-12-18. ISBN 0881258067.

External links

• Works by Jakob Wassermann at Project Gutenberg

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