Zeugnisse Zur Debatte Um Die Kafka-Manuskripte 3/7/12 7:37 AM
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Zeugnisse zur Debatte um die Kafka-Manuskripte 3/7/12 7:37 AM Zeugnisse zur Debatte um die Kafka-Manuskripte (1) (...) "I refer to your letter of 16 November, requesting permission to reproduce the collection of Kafka manuscripts held in the Bodleian Library. I have to inform you, on behalf of the owners of the Mss concerned, that such permission cannot be granted." (...) (2) (...) "Concerning the scanning of the Kafka manuscripts at the Bodleian Library, I would like to meet you personnally to discuss our project. (...) Also I herewith ask you to, please, send us the adresses of the owners of the Kafka manuscripts at Oxford as we would like to mail them our opening volume. You will understand that we feel the need to inform them about our project and plans. You may have heard that some of the publicity after our press conference on January 2 at Frankfurt Literaturhaus focused almost exclusively on the issue of two competing publishing houses. Aside from the fact that ours is - compared to S. Fischer - a very small operation, I can assure you that we are not engaged in this kind of competition. I feel confident you will realize our project is in the public interest when you have seen the opening volume. As is the case with our historical-critical Hölderlin and Kleist editions (made possible by public and private subsidies), we try to make the full literary heritage of these authors available. The quality of the manuscript reproductions speaks for itself." (...) (3) (...) "I thought that I had made it clear, in my letter to you of 2 December last, that access to the Kafka Mss. held in the Bodleian Library cannot be granted to you for the purposes which you mention. I trust that our correspondence may now be considered closed." (4) (...) "Of course, I am aware of the correspondence you have had with Mr. Wolff. Nevertheless, I beg you to reconsider your former stance and allow us to reproduce the Kafka Mss in the Bodleian Library. I realize, your own edition of Kafka ran under different premises, but that should not really be a reason to become enemies. Pleading with you as one editor to the other, I am still confident that you will act according to scholarly fairness. Our edition is not directed against any other Kafka edition. We attempt to bring Kafka's text in a way we think best. If you would find it helpful, we could meet, whenever you are willing and able, to discuss the situation." (5) "This note hopes to be the start of an international appeal to Sir Malcolm Pasley, Curator of the Kafka manuscripts held in the http://computerphilologie.uni-muenchen.de/jg98/schuetterle/kafkachronik-zeugnisse.html Page 1 of 10 Zeugnisse zur Debatte um die Kafka-Manuskripte 3/7/12 7:37 AM Bodleian Library. It is outrageous, and contrary to universal principles of scholarship, that Sir Malcolm refuses to allow Stroemfeld Verlag to reproduce Kafka's manuscripts for a facsimile edition. I urge him to reconsider." (6) "I join with full conviction in Harold Bloom's appeal to Sir Malcolm urging him to reverse the decision not to allow Stroemfeld Verlag to publish facsimiles of the Kafka manuscripts on deposit in the Bodleian Library. Anyone who has seen the Stroemfeld facsimile edition of The Trial will immediately understand that this arbitrary and incomprehensible refusal is depriving scholars of Kafka's work and, indeed, the general public of a precious insight into the works of this great genius of our century." (7) "Nach dem Gesetz. Unruhe um die Kafka-Manuskripte. Der amerikanische Literaturwissenschaftler Harold Bloom und der Schriftsteller Louis Begley haben in öffentlichen Erklärungen den Frankfurter Stroemfeld Verlag unterstützt, der seit Jahren vergeblich mit Sir Malcolm Pasley, dem Kurator der Kafka-Bestände in der Oxforder Bodleian Library, um die Genehmigung zur Faksimilierung der Manuskripte verhandelt. Zum Teil des Nachlasses von Franz Kafka, der als Depositium seiner Erben in Oxford liegt, gehören die Manuskripte der Romane "Der Verschollene" und "Das Schloß" sowie die Notizhefte. Als Modell der im Stroemfeld Verlag geplanten Kafka-Edition wurden zur vergangenen Buchmesse die sechzehn Kapitel des "Process" in faksimilierter und transkribierter Form unter Einschluß und Markierung aller Streichungen, Verbesserungen und Anmerkungen vorgelegt (F.A.Z. vom 14. Oktober 1997). Das Manuskript des "Process" liegt im Deutschen Literaturarchiv in Marbach. Rechtlich ist die Lage eindeutig: Als Kurator kann Pasley, sofern dies dem Willen der Erben entspricht, Einsicht und Faksimilierung der von ihm verwalteten Bestände verweigern. Das geschriebene Gesetz aber ist hier wie stets nicht die einzige Instanz. Harold Bloom bezeichnet in seiner Erklärung Pasley's Weigerung als "empörenden" Verstoß gegen "universelle Prinzipien von Wissenschaftlichkeit". Die Kritik an Pasley entzündet sich nicht zuletzt daran, daß er zugleich wissenschaftlicher Kurator der Kafka-Handschriften und Herausgeber der Kafka-Ausgabe des S. Fischer Verlages ist. Der Verlag Stroemfeld sieht darin einen "offensichtlichen Interessenkonflikt". (8) "Refering to the correspondence with Dr Roland Reuss in 1984, I would like to remind you that Dr Reuss was then informed that the Kafka mss. at the Bodleian Library are not owned by the Bodleian Library but are only kept as a deposit, and Dr Reuss was then referred in all matters concerning the Kafka mss. to the curator, Sir Malcolm http://computerphilologie.uni-muenchen.de/jg98/schuetterle/kafkachronik-zeugnisse.html Page 2 of 10 Zeugnisse zur Debatte um die Kafka-Manuskripte 3/7/12 7:37 AM Pasley. As you may have heard, after several years of futile attempts to enter into a discussion with Sir Pasley, we have recently made our correspondence with Sir Malcolm Pasley public, together with an appeal by Professor Harold Bloom (Yale/New York University) and Louis Begley to Sir Malcolm Pasley asking him to reverse his decision not to agree to have made scan facsimiles of the Kafka mss for our publishing house. Today, a journalist from the Hamburg weekly DIE ZEIT called us and insinuated that the public debate is appealing to Sir Pasley to reverse his former decision, even though the mss. concerned are now under different curatorship and partly owned by the Bodleian Library. We were never informed about who owns these mss. - I do not hesitate, though, to write you right away. If the information of ZEIT is correct, I herewith ask for permission to scan the Oxford manuscripts of Franz Kafka for our facsimile edition. If in fact a new curator has been appointed, please inform him/her of our request. For your information, we mail you under seperate cover the opening volume of our Kafka edition and some reviews." (...) (9) (...) "Ownership of the manuscripts is divided between the Bodleian and members of the family, for whom the library now acts. Since the completion of the critical edition, the manuscripts are being sorted into final arrangement, fully described and conserved. It is the Library's and the family's intention, once this essential work has been completed, to proceed to the publication of a facsimile edition of the collection, in order to make it fully available to the scholarly world. Publication will require the consent of all the owners, and will be based on a formal agreement between them and the publisher. Once the cataloguing work is complete, we will be following up proposals for publication. For your information, I should add that any photography or scanning of the manuscripts will, in accordance with Library policy, be done by the Library's own photographic staff in the Library's own studio." (10) (...) "I would like to clarify that we have never asked for privileges. We asked several times for permission to reproduce the Kafka manuscripts in the Bodleian for the purpose of our Franz Kafka-Edition which is to be a "Complete Works" edition. We had asked Sir Pasley for a meeting, and I am now asking you for one to discuss the whole project. And we appeal to you to help make a constructive meeting take place soon. We can come to Oxford or London, whenever you or the family of the owners are willing to meet. If there is another party who would like to produce a Kafka facsimile edition, that will not be a problem for us. Perhaps we could even share costs. In any case we have no interest in exclusivity or in blocking other projects. As you may have heard, we had originally http://computerphilologie.uni-muenchen.de/jg98/schuetterle/kafkachronik-zeugnisse.html Page 3 of 10 Zeugnisse zur Debatte um die Kafka-Manuskripte 3/7/12 7:37 AM proposed to S. Fischer Verlag to undertake the scanning of "Process" (Trial) together. Our main interest has always been, much as you stated your own purpose, to make the manuscripts "fully available to the scholarly world". The editorial projects of Stroemfeld Verlag are supported by the non-profit Stroemfeld Fördergesellschaft, making it in large part "an independent publisher in the public interest". (...) (11) "Durch das in Kopie beigefügte Fax der Bodleian Library vom 14. Mai 1998 und einen Artikel im OBSERVER (12) vom 17. Mai 1998 sind wir erstmals darüber informiert worden, daß Sir Malcolm Pasley nicht mehr Kurator der Kafka-Handschriften in der Bodleian Library in Oxford ist. Mit dem in Kopie beigefügtem Brief haben wir gleichzeitig unseren Antrag auf Faksimilierung der Kafka-Handschriften in Oxford erneuert. Bei der Vorbereitung unserer Edition hatte uns die Bodleian Library in der Frage des Zugangs und der Reproduktionserlaubnis an Sir Pasley verwiesen. Die Briefe, die in dieser Angelegenheit zwischen Sir Pasley und uns gewechselt worden sind, haben wir in einer Dokumentation, die ich beilege, mit einem Appell von Harold Bloom und Louis Begley veröffentlicht.