Financial and commercial news from Switzerland

Objekttyp: Group

Zeitschrift: The Swiss observer : the journal of the Federation of Swiss Societies in the UK

Band (Jahr): - (1923)

Heft 117

PDF erstellt am: 05.10.2021

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http://www.e-periodica.ch September 1, 1923. THE SWISS OBSERVER. 761

Trade Outlook. year, while the " Suisse " company has since raised reaction against the horrors of the Great War. It is most gratifying to read in 77ze 77ww and its capital from 2 to 3 millions, and the Cie. Another thing is striking: whilst the novelist of other papers little paragraphs about the general Suisse de Réassurances in Zurich has effected a the first decade belonged for the greater part to improvement of Swiss trade and industry, which similar increase from 20 to 30 million francs. matter-of-fact Eastern Switzerland with its highly is reflected by the steady decrease of unemployment- - The war and the conditions which have fol- developed industrial life, many of the outstanding The figure to end of June last was 39,000, which lowed in its wake have brought many changes to writers of the new romantic movement, which be- represents - about 4.4 per cent, of the total number the Swiss insurance business. Since the German gins to take shape more clearly, have their origin of Swiss workers. One of the industries which is companies have ceased to carry on life assurance in the Canton Berne, Classic Swiss lyricism came doing remarkably well is that for the manufacture business in Switzerland, a wide field of activity from Zurich — Meyer, Keller, Leuthold were of Synthetic Jewels for watches (rubies), electric has been opened out for the Swiss companies, Zurichois — whilst Berne contributed the epic meters, measuring instruments, etc. The manufac- and it is readily understood that the large accident genius of Gotthelf to nineteenth century literature. ture of artificial silk is another branch where a companies have jumped at the opportunity and As by way of compensation, Steffen, Fankhauser, considerably increased output may be anticipated started to carry on life business. In this way two Kiiffer, Pulver, these new forces, are Bernese. in the future. new concerns have been formed. The first of One has too long considered only the naturalism near " " Muirhead's Switzerland these to obtain a concession was the Vita com- of Gotthelf's epics as typical of this canton. One in Zurich. This is a branch of the Zurich has overlooked romantic minds like those of Carl The reviewers in the English press are unani- pany Accident and has a 15 Bonstetten and Carl mous in their praise of the latest guide-book to Company capital of million Victor von Ludwig von Haller, francs, of which 3 francs are who also to that certain the "Playground of Europe"; it. belongs to the million paid up. belonged city. A noncon- Frs. made well-known series of " Blue Guides " (a commend- A special contribution of 1,500,000 was formist fervour, moreover, which certainly accounts able imitation of Baedeker), issued by Messrs. by the parent company to provide the necessary for some of the feelings of these new writers, was funds the work. The Macmillan. The only deterrent is the stiff price for organising new company always very strongly expressed in many parts of is to work in Switzerland this extends of 15s., and although one certainly obtains full only. canton. If this romantic movement Soon after the " Vita " had been the value for this small investment, it is to. be feared company further, it may even happen that literary centre founded, a second obtained a concession of Switzerland shift from that a good many intending visitors will be satis- company will quite distinctively Winterthur—a of the Winterthur towards the the fiecl with one of the numerous cheap books that in subsidiary Zurich West, more so as Basle, too, The this has deal with the subject. Several prominent writers Accident Company. capital of concern with Spitteler, Siegfried Lang and Moeschlin is Frs. 6,000,000. of late three have contributed some of the chapters, as, for produced writers who, .different as 1923 the " Union " Reassurance and much instance, Arnold Lunn, whose articles- on moun- In May of they are in themselves, as they may was founded in Zurich with a of differ from the have taineering and winter sports are most interesting. Company capital Bernese, one thing in common: Frs. of which 25 is M. William Martin, the eminent brother of our 10,000,000, per cent, paid up. they are very little influenced by the Zurich tradi- This is a branch of the Munich Reassur- tion and them no less eminent Counsellor of Legation, deals with company of Keller Meyer. All of are aiJcc Swiss History, and Art. is in charge of M. Daniel Society. avowedly of a certain cosmopolitan, better Euro- The Federal Customs the month Bund-Dauvy, Hon. Director of the Musée des receipts for pean, trend. Spitteler lived years in Russia, Lang 1.923, amounted to Frs. which Beaux Arts in Geneva. We reproduce of the of July, 12,799,875, in France, Moeschlin in Sweden. part increase the notice in 77ze TYV/zex:— was a very slight as compared with Whatever, then, the ultimate outcome of corresponding returns for the preceding For • The begins with a sketch of Swiss history. year. this young romantic effusion may be, it cer- guide the the It is no more than a sketch, bu,t it is a timely reminder the first seven months of current year tainly. goes as much against the local spirit that Switzerland has a history, and that it did not begin receipts have reached a total of Frs. 104,421,766, in poetry as did the livelier novelests with when Whymper climbed the Matterhorn or when the which is an increase of about 15J millions as the Those " " skaters invaded the Grisons. did wider outlook. writers of fiction English It not compared with the same period in 1922. even begin with William Tell -so we learn from the of the first decade who interested themselves historian, Mr. Martin, for he tells us that "the oath of STOCK EXCHANGE PRICES. in other countries as much as in the Alpine scenery the Riitli and the episode of William Tell are nowadays of Switzerland found followers in the second reckoned historians." As for the Bonds. Aug. 21 Aug. 28 legendary by critical decade who went even further. The tale that Ctesar invented Swiss Confederation 3°/i> 1903 75.50% Thurgauer accepted Julius tobogganing books when ' he sent his men sliding clown the Julièr Pass Swiss Confed. 9th Mob. Loan 5% 100.62% 100.65% zfexazzziez CaVe/7, who- published his best on their shields, critical historians do not even mention Federal Railways A—K 3J% 78.75% '79.60% between 1910 and 1915, even sought his subjects it, as far as the reviewer has been able to discover. Canton Basle-Stadt 5f% 1921 102.87% 103.00% in the Parisian zfewz-zzzozztfe Another novelist, But it is these stories and names like " Helvetia " and Canton Fribourg 3% 1892 69.75% 70.25% " Afoos, has written a bitter satire on the " Rhaetian railway which set us asking ourselves Sharks. Nom. Aug. 21 Aug. 28 questions about Swiss history, and the answers take us Frs. Frs. Frs. "Bürger," a hitherto too much glorified type; farther and farther afield from the history of the little Swiss Bank Corporation 500 646 646 another again, T/zztfo Afzzz/z, wrote a novel dealing country with mountain passes leading from one end Crédit Suisse... 500 668 677 with life in Eastern Prussia in which you could of Europe to the other. Muirhead has a paragraph Union de Banques Suisses... 500 535 534 not find a single trace of the customary Swiss on the Lion Monument at Lucerne, and that excites ci-dev. Sandoz 1000 :3280 3290 Fabrique Chimique fourth TGzz/A?/, : A man, /o/zzz even wrote a the inquiry about the Swiss Guards. Who were the Société pour l'Industrie Chimique looo 2262 2260 spirit. Swiss Guards How did there come to be Swiss C. F. Bally S.A. 1000 1005 1002 novel in English on the life of a London sailor Guards Where else did they serve Mr. Martin Fabrique de Machines Oerlikon... 500 680 (Aaron West). does his best with fourteen pages, but he has no space Sulzér 1000 645 630 Entreprises You see, full-blooded novelists are out to for details of the crossing of the passes—St. Ursula S.A. Brown Boveri (new) 500 316 311 our and Suvoroff; there would be no end to it. But he Nestlé & Anglo-Swiss Cond. Mk. Co. 200 169 170 conquer the world. They march in all directions contrives to suggest, conditions which explain what in Choc. Suisses Peter-Cailler-Kohler 100 107 106 of Europe. At the same time, the romantic poets these pugnacious times seems inexplicable—that men Comp, de Navig'n sur le Lac Léman 500 482 proceed with their analysis of the mysteries of different races should ever have been content and great proud to combine into the Swiss people. The answer of the soul. And yet at the same time, let us not is pressure from without. THE CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE OF forget, there is a little set of sturdy people build- Another section of the guide is given to Swiss art. GERMAN-SPEAKING SWITZERLAND. ing up the dialect literature,-endeavouring to endear,- To those interested the be in subject a hint may given: more and the native soil and its vernacular leave the "through" train at either Basle or Zurich: (A Lecture delivered by Dr. Paul Lang at University more, to the mass of the people. there is much to be seen at both towns ; the Swiss College on June 8th, 1923.) great National Museum at Zurich is ' close to the station. Yet, there is still one important aspect to men- There " follows a chapter of Practical Information," in J Concluded. J tion. I have not spoken of the drama yet. You which the facts are clearly stated. We would suggest Swiss said—one know a Swiss drama the 19th is 'hat in any subsequent edition more emphasis should expressionism is, I instance, of that of century be given to this statement: "Trunks may be booked which we will hear in a moment, excepted—of a hardly worth speaking about. The repeated, un- and forwarded by any train, whether accompanied by religious rather than a politically active bent. successful endeavours of Keller and Meyer are passengers or not." English travellers, as a rule, fret Stamm, Steffen are of noteworthy; was no more fortunate with at paying for their luggage, and Pulver, Bänninger, typical Spitteler forget to profit by Swiss Outer and the advantages of the Swiss system. If one is going much that is active in present-day Literature. two little plays. inner conditions ion a walking tour of two or three days, it is a! con- The purely religious element even seems to have seem to have joined hands to make success in this venience to send a bag on ahead to each stopping increased of late. Bern and Zurich have produced field impossible. The amateur theatre persisted in and be done place, it can with no more trouble than who evolution. a state of absolute the writers word the hall two new writers again emphasize this, dilettantism; good a to porter. For the purposes of the readers tourist the country is divided into eight sections—Cha- The "Hymnen" of the Bernese are kept on writing novels for which they found monix, Zermatt and the Rhone Valley constitute one, not all addressed to God, but a good many are, enough. Thus things continued right up to 1914, Lucerne and Central Switzerland another, and so forth. and of the early poems of AY^/Uzzv fl/azzzze/ with the single exception of some plays by the A is many word of praise due to the maps. The first map of Zurich deal with scruples too. Steifen, Schaffhauser, A(zzzo/(f 0/2, which were several times -r^of Switzerland a whole—is religious as admirably designed for be- the needs of the people to whom it is addressed. It a follower of Dostoievsky, has found a disciple produced by the Meininger Bühne. A change possesses the supreme merit of not insisting on impart- in Berne, who, if he has not came apparent in 1914, when Oztfo zwz GVcyws lng all the map-maker knows. It contains compara- published mystical verse, has at least written ft founded a theatre for the Bernese dialect plays, few àre lively names—quite enough—and they clearly War novel the centre of which stand a Swiss which is managed to printed. From it the tourist in according literary principles. recognizes at a glance and Swiss whose actions made Basle, where the country he is making for, the country of which the captain a private, outer Similar attempts were soon in four corners are Basle, the Lake of Geneva, the are no less incomprehensible than are those of the local poet, Dozzzzzzz'^ Mzz/Zer, wrote a number Italian Lakes, and the Lake of Constance. Best of all, of Dostoievsky's characters. The inner mecha- of genre plays in dialect. In Zurich, in 1917, a the marks many colouring off clearly the essential distinction nism of the conscience is what attracts this subtle, " Freie Bühne," the nucleus of a National Theatre, between the lowlands, with which the tourist is little does .Szz/zre/% concerned, and the Alps. A broad mauve band marks psychologizing author. Only, as the writer was founded by a man who won off the playground from brown country where the Swiss not take the reader into his confidence in the good fame as the author of the first political satire on engage in commerce, and so forth, and a big white old but tries to convey his ideas by giving Switzerland. " Das Volk der Hirten " has had so patch south of the of way, Lake Thun recalls that amazing scenes in the far a of 140 days—a success unheard of in our view from the terrace at Berne. symbollicallv-meant Spitteler manner, run the effect is often bewildering. I have chosen to country During the War an association, called speak of this apocalyptic novel here, because its the Zurich Kammerspiel-e—an organisation which FINANCIAL AND COMMERCIAL NEWS atmosphere fits in better with the religious poetry had produced by the ^czyo;zzze7 of the Zurich Theatre FROM SWITZERLAND. of the second decade than with the rather realistic some original Swiss plavs—did some good towards novels of the first. It stands perhaps for the be- helping would-be dramatists. 77azzx (hzzzs, the only The Swiss insurance companies passed through ginning of a series of romantic novels for which representative of the political active wing of a period of varied fortunes during 1922, and the the way might seem to a certain extent to be expressionism in our country, had an anti-war results of the year's working were not uniformly prepared by Steffen's novels, but also by Spitteler's play produced, " Der Morgen." It dealt with thé favourable. Many of the companies, had serious " Imago." Without " Imago " Bankhäuser would conquest of Troy. His violent drama of youth, difficulties to surmount. In the majority of cases, never have dared to deal with the amazing case " Der Lehrling," in which an idealistic and gifted however, the net profits realised for the year of disintegration of personality as he does in his son is shown who, through his growing sexuality, showed an advance on those of 1921. The com- " Der Gotteskranke." comes into conflict with his narrow-minded mother panies specialising in reassurance and transport Summing up all the different elements which we and slays her, made a sensation. Ganz is with risks were specially prosperous. They show an have found active in Swiss literature, we may say Pulver and the satirist Bührer the most serious average improvement of 45 per cent, for the year. that a reaction against the weo-Kellerists, who had competitor in the field of the Swiss drama. As Only one of the important companies—the Bâloise- th'eir day until about 1900, also perhaps against the a writer of comedies chiefly we may mention Incendie—was forced to pass its dividend, owing intellectual lucidity and the eye-cult of Spitteler, the critic /U/eysy, who had three plays to losses sustained on account of the depreciation has set in. The young AWzawffr il/oz'ewe/tA as one produced with considerable success. Attempts in of foreign exchanges. might describe it, was partly, no doubt, influenced by this line by Moeschlin and always repeated attempts The " Zurich " Cie. générale d'assurance contre contemporary German expressionism, but to a far by a very cultivated Basle writer, C. Q. üttrzzozzWz, les accidents et la responsabilité civile and the greater extent it is born out of the soil. Quite who is at the same time a great scholar, have not *' Neuchâteloise " increased their capital during the distinctly it was strengthened by the general public met with great response. The hope is, however, 762 i THE SWISS OBSERVER. September 1, 1923.

WATCHES were placed top at the last official British Observatory watch tests, being awarded 96.8 points —only one-tenth of one point below the world's ZENITH record. The series prize for the six best Deck and Pocket Chronometers at the last official test at Swiss Postal Travellers* The Zenith Watch Co. (Gt. Britain) Neuchatel was also awarded to Zenith watches. 119. HIGH HOLBORN, W.C.1. Factories: LE LOCLE (Switzerland). 5oU iy /eac/ing Jewe//ers everywhere. Cheques. permitted that the Swiss drama will at last find THE 1924 FEDERAL SHOOTING realisation in the course of this century. It can- CHAMPIONSHIPS at AARAU. The Swiss Postal Authorities not be in vain that so much of the energy, amongst have the issue in the younger writers is bent upon the drama. You The subjoined appeal has been addressed by the arranged for have, of course, heard of Knittel's attempt to write organising committee to the Legations and Con- Great Britain of Postal Travellers' a Swiss drama in English. I ought also to mention sulates, as well as Swiss Rifle Societies abroad: — that we have now a really strong dialect tragedy La Société suisse des carabiniers célébrera en Cheques, which can be cashed by an author unfortunately dead—Pa«/ T/aZZer— 1924 son centenaire. A cette occasion les premier without formalities at Post a thing not held possible twenty years ago. tireurs de la ville d'Aarau, qui est le berceau da la any Summing up, we may probably be safe in saying Société suisse des Carabiniers, organisent le Tir Office in Switzerland. These that the contemporary literature of German-speaking fédéral. Cette réunion augmentera d'importance, Switzerland shows in general a status of which d'abord du fait de ce Jubilé, et aussi pareeque cheques may be obtained in she need not be ashamed. Many interesting things 1910, à de la depuis et .cause guerre mondiale, London from the in it undoubtedly go back to impulses received aucune manifestation de ce genre n'a pu être or- through the shock of the War. The presence in ganisée. Celle-ci doit devenir le rendez-vous de la Switzerland during that time of a number of famous grande famille des tireurs suisses, qui auront ainsi foreign writers must also be taken into considéra- l'occasion de démontrer, par leur arrivée en masse, SWISS BANK CORPORATION, tion. Yet, the War is over, these people have leur attachement inébranlable au drapeau fédéral gone back, and still the tendency towards a finer et de promettre de lui vouer toutes leurs forces 43, Lothbury, E.C.2 & 11c, Regent St., S.W.I. craftsmanship and a wider outlook, both movements pour la secourir au moment du danger. Nos à noticed by the critics long before the War, are nationaux qui habitent l'étranger ne doivent pas 53 steadily increasing. The finest book by Siegfried manquer à cette manifestation. has Lang has only just appeared, so the significant Nous ne cédons pas seulement à une impulsion romantic novel by Alfred Fankhauser and the clever personnelle, mais nous répondons aussi à un voeu East Prussian novel by Hugo Marti. Banniger général, sorti de milliers de poitrines suisses, et imposes himself more and more every year, and nous adressons une invitation amicale et confédérée Swiss Sparkling Apple Juice Steffen makes a wider and wider appeal with his tireurs et sociétés suisses de aux aux tir, comme (CHAMPOMME). novels, which are imbued with pure and delicate aussi à toutes les sociétés suisses à et l'étranger, Pure, natural, unfermented. Guaranteed free from Alcohol. feelings. As to Spitteler's influence, it must not nous leur demandons de revenir dans leur patrie be underestimated cither. He, with his elaborate à l'occasion de cette fête de l'amité confédérée, importer/ /rom Me artistic conscience, his faith in himself and his afin de se les autres tireurs dans le mesurer avec Swiss Non-Alcoholic Wine Co. Ltd. final victory in spite of all handicaps of environ- noble jeu des armes et afin de se réjouir avec eux, be ment, shines for ever as an example to followed. dans cette heure solennelle, de leur origine commune. .BoM/ed o»rf SoM &// t/ie the is His influence on the revival of epic already La ville de .fête organisera, à l'intention des last WATERLOO BOTTLING CO. Ltd., to be noticed. Hugo Marti published year sociétés suisses à l'étranger, un concours de sections a northern " Balder," which in its 228/232, Waterloo Station Approach, S.E.I. epic, prose spécial. Elles pourront facilement y prendre part, passages very strongly" denotes the influence of Telephone; Hop 3630 (3 lines). " car la pjarticipation minimale y sera entièrement Prometheus und Epimetheus." libre et elle sera laissée à l'appréciation des comi- into there- Cases of 24 delivered free Taking everything account, we may, tés respectifs. Chaque section remportera chez elle, reputed pints 15/-, London. whereas the first decade of the fore, say that, comme prix d'honneur, un don précieux qui lui characterised Swiss lite- A most delicious beverage, straight from the magnificent orchards twentieth century was in rappelera longtemps les belles heures passées au fiction of Sunny Switzerland. A fine drink for the family. rature by the rise of promising writers of sein de la patrie. and Spitteler's great epic, showing m&ny realistic Doctors Recommend if. Supp/fevis8). From 2è Guineas. CAe/