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DIE FÀHJGE HAUSFRAÜ ERHÂLT DEN STAATi FAMILY, NATION AND STATE IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY GERMAN AND AUSTRIAN LITERATURE

DISSERTATION

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of

The Ohio State University

By

Ester Riehl, M.A.

*****

The Ohio State University 1997

Dissertation Committee: Approved by Professor Dagmar Lorenz, Adviser

Professor Bernd Fischer Adviser Professor Leslie Adelson Graduate Program in German UMI Number: 9731699

Copyright 1997 by Riehl, Ester

All rights reserved.

mvn Microform 9731699 Copyright 1997, by UMI Company. All rights reserved.

This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code.

UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI 48103 Copyright by Ester Riehl 1997 ABSTRACT

Philosophers from Aristotle to Adorno have noted that the organization of the state has a strong relationship to the organization of the family. Beginning with this assumption^ my dissertation explores how that relationship functions in literary texts. The recognition of such a relationship inherently questions the nineteenth-century notion that society is divided into separate public and private sphere. If the state depends on functions the family performs, then the two alleged spheres are not at all separate. By focusing on two German and two Austrian texts, this dissertation puts the question of family, state and nation into contrasting national contexts. Two of the authors are men and two are women, offering separate gender perspectives. Nationalism in Germany in the second half of the nineteenth century focused on creating a German identity that could be identified with the Prussian-German state founded in 1871. The "national question" in the Austrian

Empire during the same period focused on how the relationships among the different nationalities within the empire.

ii The two German texts, Gustav Freytag's Soli und Haben

(1855) and Gabriele Reuter's Aus outer Famille (1890), link

German identity to the patriarchal feimily, in which the men

are solidly bourgeois, the women appropriately domestic, and

the entire family respects the strength and superiority of

the German nation. Freytag's novel glorifies those forms of

family and nation, while Reuter's novel criticizes them. The two Austrian texts, on the other hand, explore the possibilities of non-patriarchal, non-hierarchical families.

Set in Moravia, Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach's BoZena (1870) crosses class and national boundaries while envisioning a matriarchal family. A marriage based on equal partnership stands at the center of Adalbert Stifter's novella Briaitta

(1844), and the protagonists, Hungarian landowners and their

German guest, engage in a form of nation-building that does not lead to the subjugation of other nations.

Ill ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to thank my advisor, Professor Dagmar Lorenz, for her advice and support, as well as her prompt reading of numerous drafts. Her friendly and witty encouragement during the final stages of the dissertation helped alleviate some of the stress resulting from impending deadlines.

I thank Professor Leslie Adelson for her thoughtful comments on all of the chapters. She and Professor Bernd

Fischer provided questions and suggestions during the entire writing process, for which I am grateful.

Jim Jones and Margarets Landwehr, both of West Chester

University of Pennsylvania, gave me continual encouragement.

I am thankful for their advice as they helped spur me toward completion.

IV VITA

September 2, 1966 ..... Born - Annapolis, Maryland

1990 ...... B.A. German and English, University of Delaware

1990-1992 ...... Graduate Teaching Assistant University of Delaware

1992 ...... M.A. German, University of Delaware

1993-1994 ...... Graduate Teaching Associate The Ohio State University

1995 ...... Part-Time Instructor University of Delaware

1996 ...... Graduate Teaching Associate The Ohio State University

FIELDS OF STUDY

Major Field: German TABLE OF CONTENTS

A b s t r a c t ...... il

Acknowledgements ...... iv

Vita ......

Chapters:

1. Introduction: Domestic Nationalism...... 1

2. The Spheres that Are Not: Nation and Family...... 10

3. Soil und Haben: The Plan for a Nation ...... 57

4. Aus outer Familie as Criticism of Domestic Nationalism ...... 101

5. Of Maids and Mothers; BoZena ...... 150

6. Unconventional Families, Unconventional Nations; Briaitta and the Concept of Home ...... 187

7. Conclusion: Nations and Families ...... 221

Bibliography...... 232

VI CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION:

DOMESTIC NATIONALISM AND GERMAN LITERATURE

Bourgeois German literature in the second half of the

nineteenth century showed great concern for the guestion of what was German. With the growth of the nationalist movement

at the middle of the century, and the birth of the German

national state in 1871, this concern is not surprising.

Proponents of the national state had to create and define a

category that had not existed before: German. The rise of

German nationalism coincided with the rise of the bourgeoisie, and the two became inextricably linked. The notion of respectability, argues George Mosse, at first helped define the bourgeoisie by contrasting it against the perceived immorality of the aristocracy and the crudeness of the uneducated lower classes. The bourgeoisie also sought a stabilizing identity as a defense against the dramatic changes brought on by industrialization and urbanization in the nineteenth century. Nationalism "absorbed and sanctioned middle-class manners and morals and played a crucial part in spreading respectability to all classes of the population, no matter how much these classes hated and despised one another" (Nationalism 9). Strictly defined gender roles played a central role in the notion of respectability, since the relatively new form of the nuclear family defined male and female roles more rigidly than kinship bonds had done in the past, it controlled individuals more. "The triumph of the nuclear family . . . coincided with the rise of nationalism" (Mosse, Nationalism 18) . Nineteenth-century nationalism used the image of chaste bourgeois women as ideals, instead of the image of bare-breasted warrior

Germania (Nationalism 90). By redefining respectability as a

German trait, proponents of nationalism sought to teach this trait to all classes and therefore spread a nationalist feeling.’

Joan Landes notes a similar change in the tone of nationalism in France. Following the political activity of women in the Revolution, women were increasingly relegated to the domestic sphere. This change occurred, argues Landes, as post-revolutionary France needed new symbols to replace the monarchy. The figure of Liberty, for example, a symbol of the revolution and the republic, had always been a woman.

’ Nationalism did not, of course, belong only to the bourgeoisie. But as the size and relative strength of the bourgeoisie grew in the nineteenth century, it had to be convinced of the importance of nation. Landes points to a change in the depiction of Liberty from the revolutionary period, where Liberty heroically led battles, to the Napoleonic era, where artists depicted

Liberty as a domestic and maternal figure (159-60). Landes argues that under the old regime, French society was ordered by class distinction. When class distinction no longer existed, a new order was needed. That new order was based on gender: "In their preferred vision of the classical universe, bourgeois men discovered a flattering reflection of themselves— one that imaged men as properly political and women as naturally domestic" (4) This emphasis on

"natural" domesticity for women, however, was no less contrived than earlier arguments that defended "natural" class distinction.

Journals and popular literature played a prominent role in forming German national identity, and Kirsten Belgum describes the nationalist messages in the ostensibly apolitical popular journal Die Gartenlaube. This nationalist literature differed from other nationalist literary trends.

While authors had long glorified the feats of Germanic heroes from Siegfried and Arminius to Wallenstein and

^ The non-agrarian nuclear family developed new models of gender roles as labor left the household, and theorists in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries debated women's roles. Women of the emerging middle class were not needed to work on the farm for the direct survival of the family as they had in previous times, therefore new roles had to be invented for them. Wilhelm Tell, the nationalist literature that appeared in the Gartenlaube focused more on domestic lives than on military heroes. The journal's official target audience included the entire family, but it focused primarily on the women in the family. "The explicit inclusion of women readers was central to its establishment of the middle-class feimily as the basic building block of German identity"

(Belgum 92). Articles in the Gartenlaube praised middle- class virtues in both fiction and non-fiction forms and claimed those virtues as specifically German in origin.

"Middle-class domestic virtue steps in as a cure for a whole host of moral ills" (Belgum 101) in Eugenie Marlitt's novel

Goldelse. which appeared in a serialized version in the

Gartenlaube. Belgum describes articles that praise the domesticity of American housewives but end up qualifying that praise "when the gradual spread of a sensible household economy in America is credited to the influence of German immigrant women" (95). Mingled with the praise of American housewives and the German housewives who influenced them appeared a prescriptive element as well: German women were told exactly how a good German household should be run. This literature was intended to mold its female readers into good domestic Germans.

In this context of literature linking nationalism to domestic issues, I have chosen three novels and one novella published in Germany and Austria in the second half of the nineteenth century. The two German texts, Gustav Freytag's

Soil und Haben (1855) and Gabriele Reuter's Aus outer

Familie (1890), link German identity to the patriarchal family, in which the men are solidly bourgeois, the women appropriately domestic, and the entire family respects the strength and superiority of the German nation. The two

Austrian texts, on the other hand, explore the possibilities of non-patriarchal, non-hierarchical families. Marie von

Ebner-Eschenbach's Bo2ena (1870) crosses class and national boundaries while envisioning a matriarchal family. A marriage based on equal partnership stands at the center of

Adalbert Stifter's novella Briaitta (1844), and the protagonists engage in a form of nation-building that does not lead to the subjugation of other nations.

These four texts are appropriate to this study for several reasons. Their publications span a half-century of change in Germany and Austria, and their authors represent different segments of society. Authorial biography does not provide the only (or the most important) insights into a literary text, but an author's experiences do inform her/his perspective on any issue. The varying perspectives of these four authors make their texts a good combination for the study of the ideas surrounding nation and family in nineteenth-century German and Austrian literature. Between the publications of Freytag's and Reuter's novels, the long- awaited unified Germany had become reality. Four years after the publication of Stifter's novella a violent war among nationalities broke out in the Austrian Empire. The history of that violence informs Ebner-Eschenbach's recognition of the need for cooperation among nationalities. Freytag and

Reuter grew up in bourgeois circles while Ebner-Eschenbach belonged to the aristocracy. Stifter, though of humble origins, gained access to aristocratic circles as a teacher, and one of his positions was as tutor to Metternich's son.

His position as teacher, employed by the state, also gave him some interest in preserving the system of government.

Two of the authors are male and two are female. I do not argue that any essential difference exists between male and female writing, but I agree with Silvia Bovenschen when she asks, "Is there a feminist aesthetic? Certainly there is, if one is talking about aesthetic awareness and modes of sensory perception. Certainly not, if one is talking about an unusual variant of artistic production or a painstakingly constructed theory of art" ("Aesthetic" 49) . In the historical reality of the nineteenth century, men and women experienced life differently. Freytag, for example, when he began his career as a journalist, was free to publish under his own name. Not so for Reuter, who began her writing career using her mother's name, since her family did not think it appropriate for her, a young unmarried woman, to

receive such public attention. Stifter's family did not

pressure him into an arranged marriage as Ebner-Eschenbach's

did. Gabriele Reuter and Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

experienced these things because thev were women.^ Their

experiences as women provide them with a perspective that

differs from that of their male counterparts.

Each of these four texts was widely read at the time of

its publication. The two texts by female authors, however,

have received little attention in academic literary

criticism. Freytag's novel has long been viewed as a manual

for German national identity as it shows the ideal German

citizenry (Hubrich 6). Stifter's pedagogical goals have also

received significant attention. Freytag's and Stifter's

ideas about nation and government are therefore well known,

although critics have not made a connection between their

ideas about family and their ideas about government and

nation. Reuter and Ebner-Eschenbach are known as authors who

address women's issues, and women's issues have been treated as secondary in past literary study. The "women's issues"

^ This is not to suggest that all women have experienced oppression in the same way because they are woman, what Bovenschen has called "the dark side of cultural history" ("Aesthetic" 31). Indeed, men have experienced oppression in varying forms throughout history, but seldom because they were men. Reuter and Ebner-Eschenbach experienced varying levels of restriction and oppression because they were women, but Ebner- Eschenbach led a relatively privileged life as a member of the aristocracy. they address — the structure of the family and its role in

larger society — are, however, central to the organization

and function of society.* Indeed, for women in this period,

their roles in the state came through their families. A

woman was legally represented through the male head of

household (either her father or her husband), who was

supposed to look out for her interests.

A clear example of the polarized view of texts by male

and female authors can be made by comparing the reception of

Freytag's Soli und Haben to Reuter's Aus outer Familie.

Freytag's text is viewed as centering on the public issue of

national identity, and not at all about family. Reuter's novel, on the other hand, has been seen as addressing women's issues in the private sphere of the family, but having nothing to do with national identity. I will argue below that the two texts actually speak to the same issues, but from different perspectives. Freytag is primarily concerned with creating a German identity which is not possible without creating a certain kind of family. Reuter seeks to reform that kind of family, and that reform is not possible without changes in the larger structures of German society and the German Nation. Both of these perspectives

^ As motherhood was increasingly viewed as a vocation for women, a mother's role in educating their children and bringing them up to be functional members of the state was emphasized. ignore the imaginary line that divided bourgeois society into public and private spheres. CHAPTER 2

THE SPHERES THAT ARE NOT: NATION AND FAMILY

Political theorists have long made a connection between the family and the state. Aristotle traced the origins of the state to familial organizations, explaining that "the most natural form of the village appears to be that of a colony from the family" (2). "Following Aristotle, most writers said that the household was the precursor of the state; it was a form of political organization that existed before the state and out of which the state evolved"

(Gottlieb 232). The ideology defining the organization of the state has often borrowed from the ideology defining the organization of families.^ Political philosophers and leaders of political movements have invoked the idea of the family to support a variety of political forms. Monarchists such as Thomas Hobbes have invoked the image of the patriarchal family, with the king as father, to support

’ Families have taken many forms throughout history, and I will discuss some of those forms below. Unless I specify otherwise, I will use the term family to refer generically to any group of persons living together and related by blood or marriage.

10 their theories of rule. Hobbes claims, "There is simple obedience in those that are subject to paternal or despotical dominion" (113) . The same imagery has been used against the monarchy, as revolutions have called for brotherhood to achieve solidarity and combat the paternal monarchy, as expressed in the motto of the French

Revolution, demanding liberté, égalité et fraternité.

Linking the family to the larger entity of the state can stress the importance of individual participation and personal responsibility to the state. A National Socialist propaganda poster, for example, cited Adolf Hitler, who claimed, "Die Familie ist die kleinste, aber wertvoliste

Einheit im Aufbau des ganzen Staatsgefùges" (reprinted in

Adam 9) This kind of statement implies that all personal activity— even in the most ostensibly private realm of the family— can have an effect on the state.

In a similar fashion, proponents of nationalism have often invoked the famiJ.y as a precursor or model of the nation. Using familial terms to articulate political love for the nation, argues Benedict Anderson, implies natural ties to the nation (131). Ernest Renan has called the nation a "spiritual family" (19). Anne McClintock points to a

^ Hitler was not proposing a new idea, but echoing an idea supported by men from Augustine to Hegel (see Elshtain, Public 70 and 78).

11 connection between family and nation within nineteenth- century modes of understanding.

[T]he family offered an indispensable figure for sanctioning social hierarchy within a putative organic unitv of interests. Since the subordination of woman to man, and child to adult, was deemed a natural fact, other forms of social hierarchy could be depicted in familial terms to guarantee social difference as a category of nature. (McClintock 64)

Nineteenth-century bourgeois ideology posited the family as a natural unit, whose form was designated by "natural" principles. Linking the allegedly organic origins of the nation to the apparently organic origins of the family provided a familiar basis for the new ideology of the nation.^

At the same time, however, the sphere of the family has been understood to be separate from larger society.

Nineteenth-century bourgeois ideology posited the family as the center of a private sphere, purely personal and separate from the economic and political activity of the public sphere;

It [the family] seemed to be established voluntarily and by free individuals and to be maintained without coercion; it seemed to rest on the lasting community of love on the part of the two spouses; it seemed to permit that non­ instrumental development of all faculties that marks the cultivated personality. The three elements of voluntariness, community of love, and

^ Today in Germany nationality is defined by birth, further reinforcing the notion that nation has some organic unity.

12 cultivation were conjoined in a concept of the humanity that was supposed to inhere in humankind as such and truly to constitute its absoluteness: the emancipation (still resonating with talk of "pure" or "common" humanity) of an inner realm, following its own laws, from extrinsic purposes of any sort. (Habermas, Structural Transformation 46- 47)

This "inner realm," however, was not at all separate from

"extrinsic purposes" or external pressure, as the following discussion will demonstrate. I will present an overview of the history of the idea of the private sphere and the current academic commentary on the private/public dichotomy.

This discussion will demonstrate the contradictions inherent

in the nineteenth-century notion of public and private spheres. These contradictions blur the imaginary line between public and private spheres. Viewing these spheres not as distinct entities, but as interconnected areas allows me to link the seemingly separate spheres of family and nation.

HISTORY OF THE PRIVATE SPHERE

The idea of separate spheres was not new in the nineteenth century. The ancient Greeks divided social activity strictly into the spheres of the oikos and the polis. The oikos. or private sphere, consisted of women, children and slaves, and was the center of both economic production and intimate familial activity. The polis, or public sphere, was the center of political and philosophical

13 debate. Only the head of the oikos (always the patriarch) was permitted a voice in the polis. Aristotle believed that women were intellectually inferior to men, and that women therefore could only play a role in the oikos.

While the Greeks saw the private sphere as having secondary value, early Christianity brought a different status to the private sphere. "Christianity redeemed and sanctioned" everyday, private life, and condemned the immorality of public life. Christianity stressed obedience to the law, but also freedom in personal matters: "What was not under the purview of Caesar was how one chose to see oneself and the world and to live, breathe and die within it" (Elshtain, Public 60). Later Christian philosophers, however, borrowed Aristotle's notion that women could not think philosophically, and therefore should not be allowed a voice in the public sphere. Thirteenth-century theologian

Thomas Aquinas claimed that, within the household, both men and women have responsibilities to each other, but only the male head of household can have a public, civic role

(Elshtain, Public 78).

The household was the center of production in pre­ industrial Europe. Most families produced both the items they needed for daily survival (food, clothing, etc.) and goods that could be exchanged for income. A family consisted of the group of people living together under one roof.

14 including servants, apprentices, or members of an extended

family. Most peasant households probably had only between

four and six people (Boxer & Quataert 37), and only a few

wealthy families could afford to maintain large households

(Gottlieb 22) . The term Haus or aanzes Haus* was used to

refer to this group of people living and working together

(Weber-Kellermann 16) . Indeed, in the German language, there

was no word for nuclear family fKleinfamilie) until well

into the eighteenth century (Koselleck 112).

The size and form of the German aanzes Haus varied by

region and economic level, but one of its consistent

characteristics was the division of labor by need and skill

rather than purely by gender. Women were usually in charge

of child care and household management, but the latter

included a wide range of responsibilities. In a study of

seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Saxon weavers, for

example, Jean Quataert finds that even though the husband

usually owned the loom and the family business, the actual work roles were "interchangeable and fluid" (7). Because

home weaving was outside guild control, women and men

trained and worked together. When husband and wife shared

the responsibility of weaving and selling the cloth, they

* This organization of the household existed throughout Europe, but I will use the German term aanzes Haus. since modern use of the word "household" is imprecise.

15 also shared the responsibilities of child care and

housekeeping (Quataert 15).

Whereas women of the aanzes Haus played an integral

role in the production that went on in the home, women's

roles in the nuclear family were ideologically separated

from the sphere of production. When the industrial

revolution removed production from the home, women's roles

lost status, because they were no longer seen as

contributing to the economic welfare of the family.^ in the

bourgeois nuclear family, the biological function of bearing

children was interpreted as a "natural" law that destined

women to function only in the home with the family.*

In contrast to previous generations, however, it was onlv the woman, and no longer the man, who was defined by the family; and also in contrast to earlier times it was the laws of nature, history and morality that set the boundaries within which

^ I do not wish to romanticize the aanzes Haus as belonging to a golden age in which women's activities were viewed with equal importance to men's roles, as it has popularly been viewed. I must, however, emphasize that it was a form of the family in which women were an integral part of the economic survival of the family and thev were recognized for that role; "There was men's work and there was women's work, adult work and children's work; but only together could the household economy manage to survive" (Boxer & Quataert 40).

* Biology was not the only "natural" force on which some theorists based their arguments. Nineteenth-century sociologist Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl defended strict limitation of male and female roles based on "natural" rules of grammar. State fder Staat) is a masculine noun, clearly indicating a masculine realm, he claimed, while family (die Families is a feminine noun, indicating that women belong in the family (260-261).

16 the female sex had to develop, under the penalty of 'going against nature' if they were transgressed. (Hausen 61)

As men became defined primarily by careers and public activity, women became more and more defined by their

"natural" role as mother, thus widening the gap between male and female roles and spheres of activity.^

Ute Frevert finds a reason for this increased polarity in spheres in the rapid social and economic change in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in the German lands. The industrial revolution brought great change, rendering the external world of economics, communication and politics increasingly unstable. In the face of this instability, the internal world of the home took on a larger meaning. Women were assigned a role that became complementary or opposite to the outside world, and this complementary role became a central tenet of bourgeois ideology ("Bürgerliche

Meisterdenker" 40-41). This idea of complementary roles also contributed to the development of a bourgeois identity, as members of the bourgeoisie attempted to distinguish themselves from other classes. Members of the bourgeoisie

^ The Protestant Reformation also affected ideas about women. Luther placed women's roles sguarely in the household as wife and mother. While the situation for Catholic women in the middle ages was in no way ideal, women did have an alternative to marriage and children; the convent. The convent offered education unavailable to women in secular society and a life relatively free from male domination. See Lorenz, "Kloster."

17 viewed aristocratic lifestyles as inunoral, and one factor in this perceived immorality was the social freedom allowed to women of the aristocracy. Women of the peasantry and working classes, whose economic positions required physical labor, were seen by the bourgeoisie as crude and unfeminine. The bourgeois notion of femininity, which restricted female activity to the home and family, helped to distinguish bourgeois women as members of a class, separate from those above and below them on the social scale (Frevert, Women

31) . The home, or domestic sphere, became a feminine domain.

While the domestic sphere of the home was increasingly constructed as a feminine domain, the public sphere became the realm of the masculine. Joan Landes argues that the defeat of the old aristocracy in France "gave way to a more pervasive gendering of the public sphere" (2). Women of the nobility had access to the political activity of the court and participated actively in salons, and bourgeois reformers saw this feminine influence as detrimental to the public sphere. The participation of women allegedly added to the decadence of the Ancien Regime. Bourgeois reformers sought to differentiate themselves in every way from what they saw as the effeminacy of the court and the aristocracy. To that

18 end they needed to emphasize the (alleged) masculinity of the bourgeois public sphere.®

The idea of separating male and female spheres of activity was heavily influenced by Jean-Jacques Rousseau's notions of citizenship, which emphasized the complementary relationship between men and women. Men, he claimed, were more autonomous and independent, giving them the ability to function in the public world of commerce and politics, while women were nurturing and supportive, the perfect abilities for caring for children and supporting a husband. Rousseau's notions of male and female roles had a long-lasting effect on bourgeois ideals.

Like Rousseau, the progressive-minded German reformer

Theodor Gottlieb von Hippel believed that women had specific and decidedly female traits. Rather than using those different traits as a reason to restrict women's roles, however, Hippel wished to expand them. He argued for better education and employment opportunities for women based on the assumption that women are "naturally" more modest, gentle and moral than men, and therefore better suited for some professions, similar Erqanzungstheorien (theories of

® Middle-class Jewish women stayed more active in commerce than their Gentile counterparts. Since Jews were barred from the civil service, law and medicine, most middle- class Jews were businessmen. Often travelling on business, these men left the day-to-day management of the businesses to their wives (Kaplan 7 & 29) .

19 complementarity) formed the basis of arguments on women's roles in society well into the twentieth century

(Bovenschen, Imaainierte 27). The notion that men and women are inherently different in character, temperament and morality was often used to limit women's opportunities to the sphere of household and feunily. This delineation of roles "served to reinforce patriarchal authority" (Hausen

61), since it removed women totally from economic production and denied women any part of the economic power in the family. The ideology of separate male and female roles strengthened the notion of public and private spheres, as arguments for the division of roles were based on ideas of

"natural" differences between men and women.

"Natural" differences in intellect and ways of thinking between men and women were central to the ideas of J.J.

Bachofen as well. His Mutterrecht (1861) argued that all cultures developed out of primitive matriarchal societies.

These matriarchal societies, he alleged, arose out of earlier barbaric and immoral societies, and they became matriarchal because motherhood offered the only hope in an otherwise dismal existence.

Auf den tiefsten, dùstersten Stufen des menschlichen Daseins bildet die Liebe, welche die Mutter mit den Geburten ihres Leibes verbindet, den Lichtpunkt des Lebens, die einzige Erhellung der moralischen Finsterniss, die einzige Wonne inmitten des tiefsten Blends, (x)

20 Mothers, argued Bachofen, had material ties to their offspring, which gave them a moral force lacking in men at the time.

In der Pflege der Leibesfrucht lemt das Weib früher als der Mann seine liebende Sorge ûber die Grenzen des eigenen Ich auf andere Wesen erstrecken und alle Erfindungsgabe, die sein Geist besitzt, auf die Erhaltung und Verschonerung des fremden Daseins richten. Von ihm geht jetzt jede Erhebung der Gesittung aus, von ihm jede Wohlthat im Leben, jede Hingebung, jede Pflege und jede Todtenklage. (x)

After locating the origins of all cultures in matriarchal cultures, however, Bachofen went on to argue that societies

(read: men) developed beyond that matriarchal state into the higher form of the patriarchal. The patriarchal state, according to Bachofen, is a higher form of existence because it is more intellectual and spiritual, which he also attributed to the relationship with one's offspring. A mother more easily develops a moral sense and a connection to her offspring because there is a visible, material bond between them. For a father to appreciate the link between himself and his child, he must first develop a higher moral understanding that makes him see the spiritual link, which is not so easily identified.

Though Bachofen's focus on matriarchal cultures offered some praise for women's ability to create culture out of an immoral morass, it also condemned them at the same time.

Maternalism is physical and material, and, in Bachofen's

21 view, any moral sense acquired by women will always be physical and material, implicitly inferior to the more highly developed spiritual morality he saw in paternal society. In this sense, Bachofen added another brick to the argument for separate spheres of influence for men and women, since he claimed women are more "naturally" inclined to domesticity.

Hegel's model of marriage is equally contradictory.

Hegel, argues Jo-Ann Pilardi, "develops an analysis of the human mind with stresses its definitive hostility" (5) . One place where this hostility is supposed to be overcome is in marriage. In Phànomenoloaie des Geistes. Hegel defines the marriage relationship as one based on the mutual recognition of consciousness (347). In Philosophie des Rechtes. he claims that marriage is the realm of "freier Hingebung" of both individuals (§168). But in Philosophie he also delineates the roles of male and female in the family, relegating the male to the public and the female to the family, and private sphere. He bases this distinction on so- called "natural" differences:

Der Unterschied zwischen Mann und Frau ist der des Tieres und der Pflanze: das Tier entspricht mehr dem Character des Mannes, die Pflanze mehr dem der Frau, denn sie ist mehr ruhiges entfalten, das die unbestimmte Einigkeit der Empfindungen zu seinem Prinzip erhalt. Stehen Frauen an der Spitze der Regierung, so ist der Staat in Gefahr, denn sie handeln nicht nach.den Anforderungen der Allgemeinheit, sondern nach zufalliger Neigung und Meinung. Die Bildung der Frau geschieht, man weiB

22 nicht wie, gleichsam durch das Leben als durch das Erwerben und Kenntissen, wahrend der Mann seine Stellung nur durch die Errungenschaft des Gedankens und durch viele technische Bemühungen erlangt. (§166)

As Hegel defines the family, for all practical purposes, the husband rules. The husband legally represents the family, and administers its property (§171). Therefore husband and wife cannot have this equal recognition, because by Hegel's own standards they are inherently unequal. Sally Scholz elaborates :

In the master/slave dialectic, Hegel argues that one's consciousness is confirmed through its being reflected back from another. The two must, however, have equal status, i.e., self consciousness is confirmed from another self of the same kind. This is why the master-slave relationship must be overcome or transcended. In the marriage relationship, two different types are joined: the male whose ethical realm is civil society/state (public) and the female whose ethical realm is the family (private). (363)

So Hegel contradicts himself when he forms a definition of marriage. He says that marriage is a relationship that overcomes the natural competition between individuals, but to achieve the "freie Hingebung" of each partner, the individuals must have equal status, and his definitions of male and female roles render them unequal.

Not everyone subscribed to this interpretation of roles for men and women. Socialist theorists, most notably

Friedrich Engels and August Bebel, argued that women are more disposed to concentrating on marriage and household

23 duties than men only because they are trained and educated to do so. Engels adapted Bachofen's notion of primitive societies being communal, but disagreed on how patriarchy arose. While Bachofen saw the coming of patriarchy as a move toward a higher, more spiritual existence, Engels linked the development of patriarchy to economic exploitation. In primitive societies, argued Engels, no difference between public and private labor existed, since all labor performed both in and outside the household was for the good of the entire community. Household management was therefore not devalued as merely "private" labor (Engels 137). The solution to the inequities between men and women in the

"private" household, according to Engels, is the removal of economic pressure from the family.

Bebel agreed that education for women needed to improve if women were to play an active role in the "public" world.

He expected that technological advances would free women from the drudgery of household work and allow them to advance publicly.* Bebel went so far as to call bourgeois

* Lily Braun called for "changes in the household structure to allow women, particularly mothers, to pursue jobs and careers without carrying the 'double burden'" (Allen 167) . The freedom of housework predicted by Bebel has not come to pass. A 1988 study in the United States showed that women who worked full time outside the home still spent an average of thirty-three hours each week on housework (Lennon and Rosenfeld 517). While this work has undoubtedly been made easier with the arrival of the dishwasher and vacuum cleaner, it still usually falls on the mother to take care of these chores.

24 . marriage a form of prostitution, since most bourgeois marriages in the nineteenth century, even with the romantic notion of Love, were primarily financial arrangements (141).

His criticism gives insight behind the notion that the private sphere of the home provided a "community of love" that was based on "voluntariness." This insight supports

Habermas in his argument that the bourgeois family only

"seemed" to provide these things.

While Engels and Bebel both recognized problems arising out of the separation of the household as a "private" sphere, neither suggested reevaluating its status as such.

Both wished to rescue women from secondary status by bringing them into the "public" work force, rather than recognizing the importance of the labor performed in

"private" spheres.

REAL FAMILIES: HOW SEPARATE IS THE PRIVATE SPHERE?

In practice, the theoretical separation of spheres is contradictory. I have alluded to the origins of the distinction between public and private in ancient Greek society, and contradictions exist already in the original usage. Participation in the polis. or public sphere, was limited to those men who headed an oikos. or private sphere.

Only those men who both owned property and were in a position to be freed from the private labor of the household

25 had the luxury of participating in the polis. "Status in the

polis therefore was based upon the status as unlimited

master of an oikos" (Habermas, Structural 3). In other

words, public status depended on a private role (Elshtain,

Public 12).

The notion of separate spheres could begin to become

reality in nineteenth-century Western Europe only where

families could afford to live on one income (that is, the

husband/father's income). The agrarian classes and the

working classes could not afford to organize families in the

way of the bourgeois ideal, so this ideal became a status

symbol for the bourgeoisie. Sibylle Meyer describes the

significance of this status symbol among nineteenth-century

bourgeois families. Since only the wealthiest families could

support enough servants to do all the work, and most of the

educated middle class employed only one maid, the status

symbol of the idle wife was out of reach for many families.

Still, many women took great pains to appear idle. Hand

lotion, for example, was marketed to housewives who had to work hard in the home, but did not want their hands to betray the work they did (Meyer, Theater 75-76).

This emphasis on appearance masked the drudgery of every day life for most bourgeois women. Only by saving money in the daily budget could housewives give parties that would impress the right people and advance their husband's

26 careers (Theater 21). Housekeeping manuals and journals like

Daheim (1865-1940/1) and Furs Haus (1882-1912) gave advice on how to economize in the household in areas from stretching food to furnishing the salon appropriately. Women also worked in cottage industry to supplement their husbands' incomes, but "gegenùber der Offentlichkeit muBte die Heimarbeit bûrgerlicher Frauen peinlichst verborgen werden" (Theater 74).

While those people who subscribed to this bourgeois ideology frowned upon the employment of women in the external world, many women of the lower classes sought employment outside their homes. The industrial revolution that slowly moved the means of production away from the home and removed bourgeois women from economic production did not treat all women the same way.

Das gleiche okonomische System produzierte noch einen anderen Familientyp, der von Anbeginn an in einem ausweglos tragischen Kampf gegen die vom Kapitalismus gesetzten unmenschlichen Lebensbedingungen stand: die Arbeiterfrau und ihre Familie. (Weber-Kellermann 128)

As the bourgeois household increasingly became a sphere of consumption rather than production, the goods needed there had to be purchased from outside of the household. These goods were produced in factories, often by underpaid and overworked women. The economic changes brought about other changes in families. In previous centuries women of economic means often hired wet nurses for their babies, and lower

27 class women usually breast-fed their own children. "In the course of the nineteenth century, privileged women generally abandoned the use of wet nurses, but poorer urban women who worked outside of their homes began to use them in greater numbers" (Anderson & Zinsser 245). The maternal ideology that encouraged women to nurse their own children affected only those women whose economic situations did not force them to work outside their homes.

Many women worked as domestic servants. Despite the ideology that claimed women should not work, hiring women as servants was relatively easy to justify for bourgeois employers. Since these women were working within a family

(albeit not their own families), they were still within the protection of the familial sphere.Often, however, domestic workers received no protection in their jobs: they were fair game for sexual conquest by their employers or employers' sons, they were poorly paid, overworked, and had no job security (Weber-Kellermann 124-125). Undoubtedly, some employers treated their servants better than others, but the trend seems to have been in showing little courtesy to servants. These women were necessary in maintaining the fiction of the haven of the intimate sphere in the home:

Manservants were much less common, since they tended to be more expensive. Some bourgeois families would engage menservants only on special occasions, for events where it was important to look prosperous (Gerhard 51).

28 servants were expected to perform the hardest physical labor to spare the lady of the house from the indignity of hard work. Labor that was unacceptable for a middle-class woman was considered praiseworthy in a domestic servant (Weber-

Kellermann 119) . This contradiction was necessary to keep bourgeois lifestyles intact.”

Middle-class housewives made direct contributions to the social and economic survival of their families, contradicting the popular notion that wives provided only the "spiritual" support to the family, even if they had to maintain the fiction of passivity. The line between

"spiritual support" and physical labor in the household was often unclear. Nineteenth-century housekeeping manuals stressed the importance of proper household management in maintaining the happiness of a home. The subtitle of the manual Die Hausfrau (1861) by Henrietta Davidis, Praktische

Anleitung zur selbstandioen und sparsamen Fùhruna des

Haushalts. eine Mitaabe fur iunae Frauen zur Forderuna des hauslichen Wohlstandes und Familienalùcks. clearly indicates that a woman's housework should both help the family financially and also make the home happy. Davidis explains that her goal in writing this book is to make happier homes for women. This goal can be reached, she says, if young

” A similar contradiction existed in sexual mores. Middle-class men expected their wives and daughters to be chaste, but themselves often visited prostitutes.

29 women fulfill their duties to their husbands. The "schonste

Aufgabe des weiblichen Berufs” (302), explains the manual,

is providing for her husband's contentment;

Darum erlaube ich mir die j ungen Frauen nicht nur auf die Pflichten der Hausfrau aufmerksam zu machen, durch deren treue Erfûllung sie wesentlich dazu beitragen werden, dem Unfrieden vorzubeugen, des Mannes Mühen zu erleichtem und ihm und sich selbst eine moglichst sorgenfreie Zukunft zu schaffen, sondem auch zugleich den jungen Frauen verschiedene Winke, aus eigener Anschauung vielfacher Lebensverhàltnisse gewonnen, als kleine Beitràge zur Begrûndung einer angenehmen Hauslichkeit mitzutheilen. (300)

The argument goes that by making her husband's "private"

life easier and worry-free, a wife contributes to the physical well-being of the family. The family will in turn benefit by the husband's increased productivity in the

"public" world. This definition of a wife's role, however,

questions the division of public and private. If a man must have the support he receives in the private sphere in order to function in the public sphere, then the two spheres are not very separate after all.

Habermas adapts the ancient Greek distinction between public and private spheres as he outlines the function of the bourgeois public sphere. The private sphere is the space where the government cannot interfere in the lives of citizens. Both the area of economic activity and the domestic sphere of the home fall into this category.

The bourgeois public sphere may be conceived above all as the sphere of private people come together

30 as a public; they soon claimed the public sphere regulated from above against the public authorities themselves, to engage them in debate over the general rules governing relations in the basically privatized but publicly relevant sphere of commodity exchange and social labor, fStructural Transformation 27)

Habermas views this development of a public sphere as a progressive step toward democracy, since it is "the public of private individuals who join in debate of issues bearing on state authority" (Calhoun 7).

In theory, individual and private interests have no place in the bourgeois public sphere, and the public sphere is open to all. But the public sphere Habermas describes is a limited one, although it takes the appearance of universality. Oskar Negt and Alexander Kluge criticize the notion that the bourgeois public sphere is democratic and universal, calling it "an illusory synthesis of the totality of society" (79). The illusion of the "public" interests of the public sphere masks the private interests that it really protects. The wealth produced by capitalism benefits private individuals, while the labor that produces that wealth seemingly belongs to the public sphere and can be utilized by private individuals (Negt & Kluge 82). The very structure of the public sphere therefore benefits the private interests of capitalism.’^

It has often been argued that democracy did not develop in Germany in the nineteenth century because the liberal public sphere did not take hold as it did in, for example,

31 In fact, as Nancy Fraser points out, the liberal public sphere, based on private clubs and organizations so praised by Habermas as being voluntary and open was not so. "On the contrary, it was the arena, the training ground, and eventually the power base of a stratum of bourgeois men who were coming to see themselves as a 'universal class' and preparing to assert their fitness to govern" (114). By claiming universality for their own experiences and interests, the wealthy men who constituted this public could safely ignore the perspectives and needs of other groups of people.

Women have made up the largest group of people excluded from the public sphere, based on their assignment to the

"private" or domestic sphere of the family, and their roles in the family prohibited participation in "public" activity outside the home. This exclusion has been of great concern to feminists, as Carole Pateman's political criticism indicates: "The dichotomy between the private and the public is central to almost two centuries of feminist writing and political struggle; it is, ultimately, what the feminist

England. Historians have sought deficiencies in the German bourgeoisie to explain the lack of a strong public sphere. Geoff Eley, however, has argued that the German unification brought by Bismarck was progressive for Germany because it brought an emerging capitalist market and industrial expansion. The German bourgeoisie did not need to be strong and join in opposition against the government since Bismarck's government already (more or less) represented their interests rBritish Model 145-146).

32 movement is about" (103). Nancy Fraser has pointed out that many feminists have been imprecise in using the term "public

sphere" to refer to anything outside the domestic sphere.

She separates the various areas feminists have included in

the public sphere into categories of the state, the

"official economy of paid employment," and arenas of public discourse (110). Habermas, however, has included economic activity in the "private sphere" of a capitalist society, because it is related to private property.

Habermas also links the domestic sphere of the family and the "publicly relevant" but private sphere of the economy. He recognizes that these two segments of life were less divided than it seems:

Although there may have been a desire to perceive the sphere of the family circle as independent, as cut off from all connection with society, and as the domain of pure humanity, it was, of course, dependent on the sphere of labor and of commodity exchange— even this consciousness of independence can be understood as flowing from the factual dependency of that reclusive domain upon the private one of the market. (Habermas, Structural 46)

Not only is the private sphere of the family dependent on the sphere of the market, but the opposite is true as well.

In a capitalist system, the market depends on the business created by private consumption in "that reclusive domain."

Habermas seems more interested in the relationship between the private world of business and commerce and the public world of politics than the relationship between the

33 domestic sphere of the family and the "publicly relevant" worlds of politics and business. His example nonetheless points to the imprecise divisions between the spheres. It is this latter relationship between the domestic sphere and the

"publicly relevant" spheres that remains the focus of my discussion.

Even at times when the distinction between spheres was largely unquestioned, the borders between public and private appear inconsistent. Central to the notion of the private sphere is the idea that it is a space where the state cannot interfere. But states have instituted laws that interfere in

"private" matters when it was in the interests of the state to do so: states have imposed taxes on private property and income, controlled trade and commerce through tariffs, regulated marriage, divorce, birth control and inheritance, and still do. The Allaemeines Landrecht fur die preuBischen

Staaten (1794) governed many aspects of family life, from inheritance and divorce to the responsibilities of each marriage partner. Paragraph 184 of the Landrecht states,

"Der Mann ist der Haupt der ehelichen Gesellschaft; und sein

EntschluB giebt in gemeinschaftlichen Angelegenheiten den

Ausschlag." Paragraph 194 admonished wives: "[Die Frau] ist schuldig, dem Hauswesen des Mannes nach dessen Stande and

Range vorzustehen" (quoted in Hubbard 50). Moreover, the state was concerned that children be raised to become

34 productive members of society, as outlined in Paragraph 108:

"Die Aeltern sind schuldig, ihre Kinder zu kùnftigen

brauchbaren Mitgliedern des Staates in einen nützlichen

Wissenschaft, Kunst Oder Gewerbe, vorzubereiten" (quoted in

Hubbard 55-56). The Landrecht controlled wife-beating as well; it forbade beating with a rod, but allowed a husband

the use of a leather whip to discipline all members of his household, including his wife (Gerhard 21). The Prussian military had an interest in strong, healthy children who would grow up to be soldiers. Battling a declining birthrate, the Landrecht therefore required healthy mothers to breast feed their children, rather than send them out to wet nurses, where they would be more susceptible to disease

(Allen 19-20). These examples of the state's interference

into seemingly private family matters blurs the distinction between public and private.

For families of the aristocracy in the Baroque period, there was no such division between public and private.

"Women's primary task was of a biological political nature: to bear a son, so the power of the state could be extended into the future" (Brandes 47). Women in the aristocracy could also influence political events through their connections to the men who ruled. In her study of women in the French Revolution, Joan Landes describes how women of the aristocracy in pre-revolutionary France participated in

35 political activities through their access to the court. In the monarchy, "private” life had "public" implications, since friendship with the king's family could help in political issues. Under the Old Regime, a few privileged women (and a few privileged men) participated in political activity, and many different groups of people were denied certain rights because of social status. When citizenship and rights became universal, the exclusion became based solely on gender. "In their preferred version of the classical universe, bourgeois men discovered a flattering reflection of themselves— one that imagined men as properly political and women as naturally domestic" (Landes 4).

With the decline of aristocratic influence during the nineteenth century, women were increasingly excluded from public political activity because of gender. Bourgeois women's movements sometimes used their roles in the domestic sphere as mothers to justify political activity. In the late nineteenth century women in the United States used their roles as mothers as an argument for their participation in certain public arenas. Middle-class women had long been active in helping to care for widows and orphans, as well as providing moral education for the poor, and they petitioned state and city governments for funding for these projects

(Ryan 279). Catherine Hall describes England's Birmingham

Female Society for the Relief of Negro Slaves as a group of

36 women who used their roles as household managers to

influence a political issue. The society encouraged women to

refuse to buy sugar that was produced by slave labor. Since women usually managed household purchases, they could make a difference in this issue. The society urged women to "use their special skills and gifts rather than pretending to be

like men" (Hall, "Gender" 26). Linda Kerber calls the

integration of political values into the domestic lives of women in the United States "Republican Motherhood": "From the time of the [American] Revolution until our own day, the language of Republican Motherhood remains the most readily accepted— though certainly not radical— justification for women's political behavior" (12) .

Feminists and female reformers in Germany used similar tactics. The most powerful idea in nineteenth-century feminist movements "was that of society as family, or 'great social household'" (Allen 3). This idea led women who otherwise subscribed to the idea of separate spheres and believed their roles were primarily defined by their families to embark on political careers in the name of motherhood. Allen argues that the first feminist cause supported by the idea of motherhood in Germany was that of education. A mother's responsibility in raising her child gave her a personal interest in guaranteeing a good education for her child (31). Slowly, the responsibilities

37 of "spiritual motherhood" spread to the welfare of children in general and was used as a justification for women's involvement in political activity.

Claudia Koonz's extensive study on women's organizations in the Third Reich also points to women using

"private" issues to justify "public" activity. In the name of family and social issues, Getrud Scholtz-Klink rose to public prominence as the head of the Women's Bureau under

Hitler and reported to no one, as long as she stayed within the realm of "women's activities" such as family and social needs. In a regime whose ideology emphasized women's roles as mothers and homemakers, Scholtz-Klink's important public role seems to contradict that ideology. Her role as a leader in women's issues, however, fit in with Nazi ideology: "The separation between masculine and feminine spheres, which followed logically and psychologically from Nazi leaders' misogyny, relegated women to their own space — both beneath and beyond the dominant world of men" (Koonz 6). Despite her support of Nazi programs, Scholz-Klink consistently denied any responsibility for the "public" policies of Nazi

Germany, arguing she was involved only in "private" issues concerning women and families. Koonz, however, recognizes the contradictions inherent in the division between public and private.

The very language of family evokes powerful and conservative images of a domestic order that

38 protects its members' freedom, privacy, and dignity against a corrosive public sphere .... This dichotomous view of public and private obscures another family function. The family, which offers refuge to its members, simultaneously prepares them to face society outside. (388)

If the "public" sphere depends on the "private" sphere, then the two are not separate at all.

Trade union movements of the late nineteenth century challenged the dichotomous view of public and private when they stressed the (male) worker's right to a "family wage" to support wife and children (Eley 316). On one hand, this argument was based on the principle that a man must be the sole economic provider for his family, but it also points to a fusing of the so-called separate spheres. Kàthe

Schirmacher in 1905 concluded that male wages depended on female domestic work, since a man could work away from home only if his wife kept house for him and his children.

Schirmacher argued that a husband was being paid for the work of two people and that he therefore owed his wife one half of his earnings (Stoer 215-216). This argument for wages for "private" work in the domestic sphere of the home shatters the notion that life and work in the home are separate from the economic life of the external world.

Schirmacher later continued this line of argument, bringing the "private" duties of women to the fore. After World War I, she called for the establishment of a "Frauendienstpflicht" in which young women between the ages of fourteen and sixteen would serve the country by learning to be better housewives and mothers. After the devastation brought

39 The ideological distinction between public and private spheres meant little to real women in real families. The daily need to care for the family and, for women of the bourgeoisie, keep up appearances and maintain reputations remained the focus for women's lives. The reality of their daily existence often defied the imagined line between public and private realms, and contradicted the notion of the family as the center of the private sphere and a haven from the outside world. The ideal family, as defined by household manuals, novels and bourgeois theorists, simply did not exist.

CREATING A GERMAN NATION WITH THE GERMAN FAMILY

Similarly, no "German nation" existed in real politics before 1871. First, the idea of Germany had to be created:

"Whoever wanted to localize Germany, which had all but disappeared from the political map of the nineteenth century, had to reinvent it as a Germany of the mind, as a literary and intellectual concept" (Seeba 357). After the creation of the concept of a German nation, individuals had to begin to identify themselves as Germans. A central factor in the development of a national identity, argues Benedict

Anderson, is the development of a vernacular language into a

by war, the Vaterland needed to be rebuilt, and its economy reestablished. Housewives, argued Schirmacher, would play a central role in the recovery from the war.

40 widespread print-language. Unlike the aristocracy, which had

international connections through marriage, kinship and

friendship, the members of the European bourgeoisie shared

little unity before wide-spread printing.

But they did come to visualize in a general way the existence of thousands and thousands like themselves through print-language .... Thus, in world-historical terms, bourgeoisies were the first classes to achieve solidarities on an essentially imagined basis. (Anderson 74)

This solidarity extended only as far as the vernacular language, however, limiting it to "national" solidarity.’^

The existence of a widespread literary language is insufficient, in itself, to create nationalism, argues Eric

Hobsbawm (Nations 102). A literary language is, however, a useful tool in nation-building. In the nineteenth century literary histories, anthologies, and handbooks of German literature were widely read by the educated bourgeoisie, providing a literary history for the German nation. Peter

Uwe Hohendahl's overview of literary scholarship in the nineteenth century clearly points to the political goals of literary historians. The historian Georg Gottfried Gervinus, for example, consciously used literary history as a political tool, and his use of history and literature to

The concept of what makes a nation has changed continually. Zernatto traces the changes in the meaning of the word "nation" through several centuries. Hobsbawm emphasizes the artificiality of the nation, stressing "the element of artefact, invention and social engineering which enters into the making of nations" (Nations 10).

41 further the cause of the German nation was not uncommon in

the Vormàrz period. "The fVormàrzl historian had a twofold

obligation with respect to literature: to reconstruct

leading ideas and to take a public stand as the only means

of bringing the past into contemporary discussion"

(Hohendahl 209). Wilhelm Scherer's Geschichte der deutschen

Literatur (1883) focused on the part played by literature in

building a nation, and Scherer described part of that goal

in the introduction. "Das erste Kapitel sucht die Wurzeln

germanischer Nationalitàt in der arischen Gemeinschaft auf und schildert den geistigen Zustand unserer Ahnen in der

Zeit, da sie den Romern bekannt wurden" (iii). These

literary histories were not academic, but intended for the general reading public, composed primarily of the educated bourgeoisie. The celebration of Schiller's birthday in 1859

"was a major turning point in the German push for a national

state . . . it was a literary suggestion that galvanized the nationalist movement" (Seeba 354).

Nationalism has taken different forms in history, and

Hans Kohn has described some of these forms of nationalism that developed in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

"Nationalism in the West [that is, England and the United

States] was based on the concept of a society which was the product of political factors." In Germany, where there existed no political state around which to build national

42 sentiment, "political ideas and social structure [were] less advanced than in the modern West" (Nationalism 30).

Nationalism was cultural movement at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and became political only with the establishment of the German Reich in 1870/71. According to

Kohn, the origins of German nationalism, with its roots in

German Romanticism, were not related to rational political goals.

To them [the German Romantics] the nation-state or folk-state was not a societal organization based on human law with the purpose of assuring man's liberty, security and happiness, but an organic personality, God's creation like the individual himself, only infinitely greater and more powerful and the fountainhead of all individual life. (Nationalism 35)

This "organic personality" that is bigger than life is something for which one can elicit personal sacrifice. The view of the nation as a natural manifestation is also linked to notions of national and cultural superiority, and gives the appearance of a right to dominate other nationalities.

Such a notion of cultural superiority can lead to conflict. Hegel's notion of historical development defines nations only in opposition to one another. The resulting competition will naturally result in the destruction of some civilizations. This destruction is not a loss, but a forward step in history, claims Hegel, because it will leave stronger nations behind: "Gewaltsamen Todes kann ein Volk nur sterben, wenn es natùrlich todt in sich geworden, wie

43 z.B. die deutschen Reichsstàdte, die deutsche

Reichsverfassung" fPhilosophische Weltaeschichte 115). If one assumes from Hegel's argument that nations must be in conflict with one another, then the idea of nationhood is doomed to be accompanied by violent struggle.

But the development of national identity does not require a violent path. Cornel West insists that "modern nationhood" must be tempered by "precious standards of constitutional democracy, rule of law, individual liberties, and the dignity of common folk" (75). Bernd Fischer argues that the irrational side of nationalism, which is backward- looking and assumes some sort of "natural" connection among a group of people, must be combined with a forward-thinking philosophy that includes protection of individual rights

(16). Nationalism need not be hampered by arguments for national superiority.

The failure of the bourgeois revolution of 1848 put dreams of a unified national Germany on hold until Prussia imposed unity from above. Nationalism, which had begun as a movement of the middle-class and the intellectual elite, had to be spread to the general population, which hitherto had not viewed itself as German at all. Identifying a non-German enemy helped to define what was German. The Franco-Prussian

War led the way to both political and ideological

44 unification of German states as the French became a common

enemy to all "Germans.”

Germans also began to view Jews as a common enemy.

Anti-Semitism grew in the second half of the nineteenth century, and historian Heinrich von Treitschke added "an aura of scholarly respectability" (Dorpalen 240-41) to anti-

Semitic sentiments. Promoting a "modified anti-Semitism"

(Mosse, Crisis 201). Treitschke argued that Jews could and should assimilate into German life and could become Germans if they abandoned all Jewishness. He feared, however, a

German-Jewish "Mischkultur" that would contaminate "pure"

German culture. He attacked intellectuals (which to him meant Jews) for infecting German minds with radical liberalism and "undeutschen Idealen" (Treitschke,

"Bemerkungen" 89-90) of cosmopolitanism. Treitschke's series of articles on the "Judenfrage" appeared in the

Preufiische rn) Jahrbücher of 1879-80, and received great attention from both his critics and supporters. Without the forum provided by this widely-read journal, his arguments may have gone unnoticed.

But none of these factors— shared print language, creation of a "national" literary history to recognize shared culture, recognition of an enemy— make a nation.

Individuals seeking to create a certain kind of nation or national state must spread their ideas to the people who

45 will belong to that state. In the case of German

nationalism, idealists such as Johann Gottlieb Fichte called

for education to create the nation he envisioned. This

education, however, was not intended to prepare the way for

a constructed version of the German nation, but was to carry

the German people through "die wahre natùrliche Fortsetzung"

(Fichte 306) in their development of the nation. This is a

natural development for Germans, he argued, because "nur der

Deutsche . . .[hat] wahrhaft ein Volk . . . und [ist] der eigentlichen und vernunftgemàfien Liebe zu seiner Nation

fàhig" (378) . This mixture of education and the idea of natural destiny played a large role in the development of a

German national ideal.

Education did play a key role in spreading national

feeling in Germany. Between 1843 and 1871 the number of primary schools in Prussia increased over fifty percent. The schools were put in place not only to teach the basic "three

Rs", but also "to impose the values of society (morals, patriotism, etc) on their inmates" (Hobsbawm, Capital 95).

What began in primary schools was then continued in popular literature. Before 1850, the average book in Germany was published in editions of fewer than one thousand copies.

Education was needed both in national identity and national language. Sprachvereine in the latter half of the nineteenth century emphasized the need to maintain national integrity by ridding the German language of intrusive foreign words. See Bernsmeier and Kirkness on language purism.

46 Improved technology and a larger reading market raised that number to fifteen thousand by 1880 (Barth 81). Increased production led to lower prices, making books and journals available to a wider segment of the population. Family journals, for example, became popular in the second half of the nineteenth century. These journals targeted the middle class and offered reading selections for the entire family.

Selections included short fiction and serialized novels as well as information on such subjects as housekeeping, travel and nature.

Belgum, Mosse and Landes agree that nationalism has depended on the family for support. A clear example of the kind of relationship they describe between the family and the nation can be found in the writings of the conservative social reformer Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl. Riehl understood the concept of control through the family, as he advocated strengthening the nation by reforming the family. In his widely-read treatise Die Familie (1855), he argued, "Die

Familie ist . . . die natùrliche Vorgebilde der

Volkspersonlichkeit, d.h. der burgerlichen Gesellschaft"

(121). The changes he saw in bourgeois society in his lifetime, such as increased social mobility and a relaxation in class distinction, disturbed him. The increased emphasis on individual choices and individual freedom seemed to Riehl destined to destroy a way of life dictated by tradition. To

47 him, social inequality was a natural phenomenon. He longed for a time when individual roles were rigidly prescribed, both within the family and.in society, and wished to return to a time when the patriarchal household was the center of society. As he saw it, the health and success of the nation depended on the health of the family, and a healthy family could be achieved only if it returned to its "natural" origins.

But is the family a "natural" unit? The biological ties between parent and child point to an elemental relationship that is hard to disprove, though various theories about procreation have downplayed the role of one or the other parent.’* While theorists have explained different versions of what those natural roles are, one perception of a

"natural" role in the family has remained relatively constant: the role of mother. An idealized understanding of this "natural" role for women led to the bourgeois ideal of the private sphere, where women functioned only within the nuclear family.

Denn erst mit der Verallgemeinerung der bùrgerlichen Familienform zum verbindlichen Familienmodell fur die ganze Gesellschaft, ja, mit ihrer Verkehrung zur Naturform der Familie schlechthin, wird die Bindung aller Frauen an Haus und Familie perfekt, gewinnt die Abhàngigkeit der

’* Ancient Greek notions of the polarity of gender, for example, assigned women only a passive role in procreation: the mother was seen to be only a "vessel" that incubated the seed planted by the father. See Bridenthal, et al, p. 5.

48 Frau ihre historisch neue, bùrgerlich-patriarchale Qualitat. (Gerhard 74)

As this ideal spread to other classes, its very scope seemed

to imply "natural" origin.

Theorists on the family, from Joachim Heinrich Campe^^

and Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl’® to Claude Lévi-Strauss” have

written about "natural" roles for women in the family. The

Allaemeines Landrecht fur die preuBischen Staaten (1794)

regulated the duties of both women and men in the family. A

contradiction exists here: if the family is a "natural" unit

and ordered by "natural" principles, it should require no

external regulation to control the behavior of its

members.

” Rhetorically addressing his daughter, but ultimately all women reading his book Vaterlicher Rath fur meine Tochter (1789) , Campe wrote, "Ihr. . . seyd vielmehr geschaffen - o vernimm deinen ehrwürdigen Beruf mit dankbarer Freude ùber die groBe Wûrde desselben! - um bealùckende Gattinnen. bildende Mutter und weise Vorsteherinnen des innern Hauswesens zu werden" (372).

’® Riehl argued that while a man could choose his career, a woman was born to hers (17).

” In the twentieth century, Claude Lévi-Strauss has argued that "there is a maternal instinct which compels the mother to care for her children and makes her find a deep satisfaction in exercising these activities" (340-1). I would argue, however, that relationships between mothers and their children are primarily defined by cultural factors. For an overview of changing attitudes toward child care in Western Europe, see Gottlieb 132-52.

John Stuart Mill noticed a similar contradiction in debates about what women can and cannot do: "If women have a greater natural inclination for some things than for others, then there is no need of laws or social inculcation to make

49 A broad look at families, however, suggests that few

"natural" forces control how that relationship between parent and child develops and how a family organizes around it. Friedrich Engels's study on the family argued that social and economic factors shape the family more than

"natural" factors. In "primitive"^’ societies people lived in communal groupings for survival. In these groupings,

Engels explained, no division between public and private labor or public and private property existed, since all work was for the survival of the group. With the development of the idea of private property, paired, monogamous marriages became the norm, so that men could be certain that their own biological children inherited their property. In this sense, monogamy "was the first form of the family to be based not on natural but on economic conditions" (128). Engels criticized marriage practices of his contemporaries as well, arguing that "The supremacy of the man in marriage is the simple consequence of his economic supremacy" (145).

Many theorists have agreed with Friedrich Engels that marriage and family structures are based on factors other than natural law. Liberal reformer John Stuart Mill argued

the majority of them do the former in preference to the latter" (49).

I have problems using the word "primitive" because it is often used to imply cultural inferiority. Since Engels chooses it, however, I will use it in discussing his work.

50 in the nineteenth century that "The power of earning is

essential to the dignity of a woman" (89) so that she will

not be entirely economically dependent on her husband.

Anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss concluded that familial

organizations and relationships are based more on economics than on any absolute family structure (343)

Historical and cross-cultural studies point to a large variety of family forms and practices. Even when viewed at one time and place, families vary.

Von der vorindustriellen Familie Oder der modernen Familie kann nicht gesprochen werden: solche Begriffe gehen an der historischen Realitât vorbei. Die Familie zeigt vielmehr eine Vielfalt von Formen und Verhaltensweisen, die vor allem durch matérielle Umstànde bzw. Produktionsverhaltnisse bedingt sind. (Hubbard 13)

Lévi-Strauss sees no absolutes in the organization of families and notes a "paramount influence of cultural factors, let us say, artificiality that presides over the organization of the family" (347). The Iroquois of North

America "counted descent matrilineally, a common practice among horticultural peoples" (Leacock, "Women" 28) . Polygamy was not uncommon among the early Germanic tribes, where a man could have a second wife (Nebenehe) to guarantee many

Many feminists have also argued that patriarchal family structure developed from economic issues, agreeing with Adrienne Rich that "At the core of patriarchy is the individual family unit which originated with the idea of property and the desire to see one's property transmitted to one's biological descendants" (60).

51 sons (Weber-Kellermann 29) . Families in pre-industrial

Europe often included people not related by marriage or blood (Flandrin 4). One cannot even speak of "the" modern western family, since families still take on a variety of forms. The concept of "traditional family values" as defined by conservative political groups in the United States has sparked a controversy that clearly illustrates the unresolved tensions surrounding the role of the family in the late twentieth century.

NATION, FAMILY AND LITERATURE

Since neither the nation nor the family existed in the forms that supporters desired, both had to be created as ideals, as worthy goals. As books and journals became more accessible in the nineteenth century, literary texts became a means in which to spread political and social tenets to the middle class. Focusing on literary texts can provide access to the history of such ideas and attitudes. Nancy

Armstrong argues that challenging the boundaries set between the genres of literature and history also challenges the division between historical truth and symbolic processes that can be read in literature. This division privileges

"real history," which is to be found in "factual" documents, while it dismisses the subjective experience that may be found in "fictitious" texts. Challenging this division does

52 not imply that literary texts unequivocally reflect all

aspects of their contemporary society, but that all texts

are inextricably linked to the social world in which they

are produced and received. Indeed, reality can only be

conveyed in texts, and even "factual” texts offer only

limited access to "real history."

The inability to directly access the "real world" does

not force scholars to give up on history, argues Edward

Said.

Even if we accept . . . the arguments . . . that there is no way to get past texts in order to apprehend "real" history directly, it is still possible to say that such a claim need not also eliminate interest in the events and the circumstances entailed by and expressed in the texts themselves. (4)

An interest in this relationship between literary texts and the "real world" in which they are both produced and received informs my interrogation of literary texts.

Literary texts, though neither completely objective nor entirely factual, provide information on the specific attitudes and ideals of groups of people in a time period.

No historical document, argues Hayden White, can every be entirely objective or true, and fictional literature is not necessarily untrue: "One can produce an imaginary discourse about real events that may not be less 'true' for being imaginary" (57).

53 Not only do texts bear witness to "real events," but they can influence real events as well. Hans Robert JauB has suggested that literature can have a "gesellschaftsbildende

Funktion"(75). Because literature is fictional, it can provide experience that does not exist in the empirical world. This experience may introduce a new morality or way of thinking to the reader, thus challenging accepted norms.

But whether or not a literary text challenges social norms, the effect it will have on "reality," or on the way people think, will depend partly on the size of its reading audience.

If the fiction selections in the widely-read journal

Die Gartenlaube were primarily used for propaganda, to spread certain ideas about the family and the nation, as

Belgum has argued, then they need to be addressed as more than "merely" fiction. As historical documents they provide insight into how specific German middle-class writers and publishers sought to shape the German family. As novels became more widely available in the second half of the nineteenth century, they too became a means of spreading political and social ideas. The Gesellschaftsroman. which grew in popularity during the century, largely concentrated on issues facing the bourgeoisie. In general terms, a

Gesellschaftsroman is a novel that attempts to realistically portray how individuals relate to one another and how they

54 relate to a larger society. At the same time it conveys certain expectations and assumptions of its author and its time. In a review of Gustav Freytag's Die Ahnen Fontane wrote what is now the most commonly cited definition of the

Gesellschaftsroman. He did not call it a GeselIschaftsroman himself, but sought to define the parameters of the modern novel.

Was soil ein Roman? Er soli uns, unter Vermeidung allés Übertriebenen und HaBlichen, eine Geschichte erzahlen, an die wir alauben .... Was soil der moderne Roman? [. . .] Der Roman soil ein Bild der Zeit sein, der wir selber angehoren, mindestens die Wiederspiegelung eines Lebens, an dessen Grenze wir selbst noch standen oder von dem uns unsere Eltern noch erzahlten. (53)

Fontane criticizes novels that display the ugly, naked reality of daily life. The artist should use the "real world" as material for a novel, but not simply write a report. An artistic element, Verklaruna. is also reguired.

Verklàruna is not simply "verschwommene Idealisierung," but the "UmwandlungsprozeB der Kunst" that allows for a complete presentation of reality (Mittenzwei 285). A novel clearly cannot show "real life" in its entirety, but the artist must learn how to make the novel seem real, without resorting to

"allés übertriebenen und HaBlichen." Adler points out that

Fontane wrote his now-famous critical review of Die Ahnen after the failure of the 1848 revolution. "[Fontanes]

Realismus kann geradezu verstanden werden als Oppositions- und Kampfbegriff gegen Werke der sozialen Kunst der Vormàrz"

55 (Adler 516). Fontana's prescriptive definition of the novel should therefore be understood as a product of a specific historical context, and not accepted as the defining principle of all nineteenth-century novels.

Three of the four texts discussed below fit the definition of Gesellschaftsroman. The fourth, Stifter's

Briaitta. is a novella. The distinction between the genres of Novella and Roman present no large problem for my discussion of the texts. Fontane himself did not pay much attention to the distinctions between the genres of Novella and Roman (Mittenzwei 278). Stifter addresses social issues in his novella that are similar to the social issues addressed by the three novels.

Embedded in each of the texts discussed below are issues related to family and nation. Freytag's Soil und

Haben and Reuter's Aus outer Familie suggest an understanding of the nation based on the model of the hierarchical patriarchal family. Stifter's Briaitta and

Ebner-Eschenbach's BoSeha. on the other hand, suggest egalitarian familial relationships in contexts far from the rhetoric of dominating nationalism. The concept of the nation based on the family questions the division between the ostensibly private realm of the family and the allegedly public realm of the nation.

56 CHAPTER 3

SOLL UND HABEN: THE PLAN FOR A NATION

INTRODUCTION

At the center of Gustav Freytag's novel Soil und Haben

(1855) is a notion that the German nation is a product of natural selection; it "naturally" holds a moral and political position over other nations. Colonialism and capitalism, systems based on competition and eventual domination of one entity over another, drive the main characters' actions. The need for order, which has become a cliche about German mentality in the twentieth century, stands at the center of Freytag's ideology. The search for order begins in the family, where individuals initially learn their proper roles; what has been learned in the family can then be transferred to the business, and later to the nation. According to the moral system of the novel,

German bourgeois businessmen, because of their specifically

German traits (FleiB, Ordnuna and Treue. to name a few) deserve to rise above their competitors.

57 The novel focuses on the education of Anton Wohlfahrt,

Freytag's bourgeois hero. At the import house of T.o.

Schroter, Anton begins an apprenticeship as both a

businessman and a German.’ By marrying his employer's

sister Anton becomes a business partner at the same time

that he becomes an official family member. The

interconnected spheres of business (capitalism), nation and

family provide the moral imperatives for the novel. Freytag

describes the importance of family and nation when his hero

leaves Prussia for Poland.

Wer immer in den gebahnten Wegen des Lebens fortgegangen ist, begrenzt durch das Gesetz, bestimmt durch Ordnung, Sitte und Form, welche in seiner Heimat als tausendjàhrighe Gewohnheit von Geschlecht zu Geschlecht vererbt worden, und wer plotzlich als einzelner unter Fremde geworfen wird, wo das Gesetz seine Rechte nur unvollkommen zu Schützen vermag, und wo er durch eigene Kraft die Berechtigung zu leben sich alle Tage erkampfen mu6; der erst erkennt den Segen der heiligen Kreise, welche um jeden einzelnen Menschen Tausende der Mitlebenden bilden, die Familie. seine Arbeitsaenossen. sein Volksstamm. sein Staat. (389, emphasis added)

These four social units— Familie. Arbeit. Volk and Staat— build on each other, beginning with the family. I will argue

that Freytag organizes his idea of the nation around his

idea of the family: the family provides order for the nation

and the state.

’ Though the political boundaries of Anton's home state are Prussian, he identifies himself and his contemporaries as German.

58 The scholarly work on Soil und Haben written in the last thirty years generally centers on three issues. The first of these issues raises the question of whether the novel is of any literary worth or is purely a tendentious piece. The second focuses on the Jewish characters in the novel. Freytag employed unfortunate negative stereotypes of

Jews, prompting some critics to accuse him of anti-Semitism, while other critics defend him against these charges. The final large issue centers on how Freytag uses this novel to promote his political ideology.

Many of Freytag's contemporaries agreed with Theodor

Fontane's praise of Soli und Haben as a "bedeutsame literarische Erscheinung” (215), but the literary academy of the twentieth century has generally ignored the novel.

Russell Berman explains;

Since the end of the Second World War, literary criticism has constructed a canon of post-1848 literature which, confirming the conservative predilections of the New Criticism and its German counterpart, "work immanent criticism," excludes explicitly political authors like Freytag. Yet no study of German culture in the ninety years between the publication of Soil und Haben in 1855 and the collapse of national unification in 1945 can be taken seriously which does not include this novel, the epitome of bourgeois thought in its transformation from liberalism to imperialism. (Rise 79)

Jeffrey Sammons recognizes Soli und Haben as a useful historical tool in the study of nineteenth-century bourgeois attitudes, but adds that the lack of critical interpretation

59 of those attitudes reduces the novel to secondary literary

importance ("Evaluation" 210) . Lionel Thomas's claim that

"Freytag's novels offer far more interest to the sociologist

than the literary critic" (59) is supported by many other

critics as well.^

The criteria by which academic literary critics

determine literary value, however, change.^ John Ellis

suggests the term "weed" as an analogy for "literature":

gardeners fight weeds and complain about them, but it is

hard to give a concrete definition for "weed." The

definition depends solely on its function in a given context

(46). "'Literature' is in this sense a purely formal, empty

sort of definition" (Eagleton 9). Barbara Herrnstein Smith

calls for a conscious recognition of how value judgements

are formed in relation to literature.

[What we are doing] when we make an explicit value judgement of a literary work is (a) articulating an estimate of how well that work will serve certain implicitly defined functions (b) for a specific implicitly defined audience (c) who are

^ See Steineke for a comprehensive history of the literary reception of Soil und Haben up to 1980.

^ Trends in Germanistik in the United States after World War II, for example, emphasized the "classical" period of German literature in what Hinrich Seeba calls an attempt "to hold on to the literary triumphs of 'the German classics' as proof of the 'better' Germany" (7). For an overview of competing political agendas among nineteenth-century German literary historians, see Hohendahl (Building 201-247) . See Holub ("Rewriting") for a description of how political movements have changed the focus of Germanistik in the twentieth century.

60 conceived of as experiencing the work under certain implicitly defined conditions. (Smith 13)

As long as those audiences, functions and conditions remain

stable, so will value judgements of literature. The realist

liberal program in Soil und Haben. for example, so praised by Fontane, receives derision for overbearing pedantry from

Sammons. Such judgements of literary value, however, hold

little importance for me, since literature has many uses, of which aesthetic explication is but one. For Soil und Haben.

following Smith's suggestion, I am interested in the questions of what function the novel served for its contemporaries.

On the second central issue of Freytag criticism, critics agree that Freytag's portrayal of Jews is negative and stereotypical, but they disagree on whether or not that portrayal should be interpreted as anti-Semitic. As early as the late 1850s Fontane criticized the novel for its unfair portrayal of Jews (227). Sammons lists Freytag's relationships with Jews and his counterattacks against

Richard Wagner's anti-Semitic pamphlet Das Judenthum in der

Musik to support his argument that Freytag's goals were not anti-Semitic (197).

Conscious racism was foreign to him; while he does not particularly stress in Soil und Haben that the behaviour of the Jews is a reflex of their oppressed condition, there can be little doubt that this was roughly his understanding. (Sammons, "Evaluation" 198)

61 Lionel Thomas defends Freytag's standpoint as "not entirely

anti-Semitic" (64) , because the novel does show that the

archvillain Veitel Itzig had already been mistreated as a

small child. Rather than portraying Itzig as having evil

characteristics that are inherently Jewish, Thomas argues,

Freytag shows how Itzig "fell into evil ways because of his

position as a Jew" (63). Margarita Pazi has pointed to

Freytag's personal life and his close friendships with Jews

(especially Berthold Auerbach), to combat the image of

Freytag as anti-Semite.

The attempts to argue that Freytag was not anti-Semitic

suggest that Soil und Haben makes it easy for the average

reader to conclude that he was. In explaining the arguments

for and against Freytag's anti-Semitism, Peter Gay points out that nineteenth-century attitudes toward Jews existed with many contradictions: "It would be futile to single out one strand— the anti- or philo-Semitic strand— as constituting the 'real' Freytag . . . ; [he], like most

Germans, was made up of both" (16) His friendships with a

few Jews do not prove any acceptance of Jews in general.®

^ To use Daniel Goldhagen's term, Freytag may be described as a "philosemetic antisémite" (50). A society in which anti-Semitism was unquestioned, even those most friendly to Jews still harbored anti-Semitic ideas.

® Treitschke had a few Jewish friends as well (Dorpalen 241) . These friendships did not hinder his anti-Semitic diatribes. The arguments that mention the evidence of Freytag's Jewish friends to defend him from accusations of

62 Freytag believed that Jews had the responsibility to "earn acceptance by society" (German bourgeois society, that is) and they could do this only by "abandon[ing] their identity as Jews and becom[ing] middle-class Germans" (Sammons 198).

Heinrich von Treitschke held similar views, claiming that

Jews must give up their "Jewishness" to become German.

Neither Treitschke nor Freytag deals with Jews as a religious group, only as a cultural one.*

Mark Gelber suggests a different approach, ignoring what Freytag may or may not have planned to do with his novel. Gelber defines literary anti-Semitism not in terms of the author's intentions but "as the potential or capacity of a text to encourage or evaluate positively anti-Semitic attitudes or behaviors" ("Alternate" 84) . In these terms, he concludes that Freytag's novel does have anti-Semitic tendencies. I must agree with his conclusion, since it is difficult to determine to what extent Freytag personally held anti-Semitic views, and such a determination would not necessarily aid a discussion of the novel. An author's personal views, though certainly related to what s/he

anti-Semitism remind me of the "unreassuring phrase of assurance" (Schultz x) that many people have used to defend themselves from accusations of racism. Schultz points out that some of the most racist of people guiltily admit that they know some "nice" Jews.

* In other words, the issue at stake was not wrong religious belief or practice, but wrong lifestyle and cultural outlook.

63 writes, provide only part of the key in interpreting a literary text. As Robert Holub comments in a similar discussion of anti-Semitism in Wilhelm Raabe's novels, "the central evidence is still the text itself, not the publicly or privately expressed views of its author" ("Raabe's

Impartiality" 618). In Freytag's novel Jewish culture poses a threat to German culture because it undermines the cohesiveness of German society. If Freytag "merely" used existing stereotypes so his audience would recognize them, use of these stereotypes still reinforces and legitimizes them. Moreover, even though Freytag may have believed that

Jews were unfairly oppressed, a progressive attitude compared to the ideas of many of his contemporaries, it is still possible that he accepted many of the negative stereotypes of Jews.^

The final issue of Freytag's national liberal ideology relates to both of the first two issues. Freytag's political ideology stands at the center of his novel, and, as Berman explains, twentieth-century literary criticism has not been kind to political texts. The question of the novel's anti-

Semitism relates to the question of national ideology, since

^ In a similar situation, many American abolitionists in the mid-nineteenth century, thought the enslavement of Black Africans was wrong, but did not think that Black Africans could be equal to white Europeans: many abolitionists "acknowledged a kind of de facto cultural inferiority that placed most free blacks on a plane lower than most whites" (Fredrickson 37) .

64 proponents of German nationalism often contrasted Jewish stereotypes against allegedly "German" traits to help define national characteristics. Indeed, Freytag's novel does this as well.® Without extensively joining in the arguments of the first two questions on the novel's literary value and its anti-Semitism, I will address this final question on

Freytag's nationalist ideology and how the novel presents a plan for the German nation.

BOURGEOIS VALUES

No critic argues against the assertion that Soli und

Haben is a political text, and that Freytag intended it to be so. Anton Wohlfahrt, Freytag's middle-class hero, embodies the virtues of the liberal German as he. develops both a middle-class and national identity.

Die Erziehung Wohlfahrts zum Burger ist zugleich eine Erziehung zum Deutschen (wobei "deutsch" eine kaum verhùllte Identitàt mit "preuôisch" besitzt) und zum Nationalen, denn die Werte des Bûrgertums sind zugleich deutsch-preuBische, nationale Werte: Ordnung, Rechtschaffenheit, Pflichterfùllung. (Steineke 142)

"Freytag verfolgte mit seinem Roman eine bestimmte, politische Absicht," (2) continues Peter Heinz Hubrich. T.E.

® "The 'liberals,' those 'friends' of the Jews, shared the central tenets of the antisémites' image of Jewishness. Even while arguing for Jewish emancipation and then for full civil equality of Jews, they too believed and explicitly argued that Jews were different from, opposed to, and deleterious to Germans, that the Jews were alien to Germany and, essentially, that they should disappear" (Goldhagen 57).

65 Carter calls the novel a "Liberal National manifesto" (323).

"Soil und Haben ist eine Verherrlichung des Bùraertxuns und

insonderheit des deutschen Bùrgertums" (224), noted Fontane.

Michael Kienzle sees "die Rechtfertigung bùrgerlichen Wesens

und Verhaltens" (54) as a central part of the novel.

Most critics fail, however, to recognize the connection

between the family and the nation in Freytag's novel. This

omission probably results from a traditional division of

issues into the categories of public and private:

discussions of nationhood and national identity have largely

concentrated on political ideas rather than domestic ones.

Nonetheless, it seems surprising that critics could ignore

the significant role families play in Soil und Haben.

Families provide the setting both at the opening and the

close of the novel. It begins by placing Anton in an honest

and hard-working lower-middle-class family and ends with

Anton about to join the Schroter family. Framing such a

blatantly nationalist text with familial scenes suggests a

close connection between family and nation.

This idea of the family at the center of the German nation does not belong to Freytag alone. Soil und Haben was published the same year as Riehl's Familie. and the two texts share many ideas about building the German nation.

Order, discipline and respect for a social hierarchy play a prominent role in both Riehl's and Freytag's plans for the

66 nation. Freytag's nationalist ideas are largely based on

Fichte's political theories from earlier in the nineteenth century. Fichte sought active participation from the members of the nation, but not democracy. Rather he sought to educate people to put the good of the group (nation) before the needs of individuals.’ This kind of group identity is learned first in the family.

Riehl claims that social difference and inequality are natural states, not cultural creations. "Indem . . . Gott der Herr Mann und Weib schuf, hat er die Ungleichheit und die Abhàngigkeit als eine Grundbedingung aller Menschlichen

Entwicklung gesetzt" (Riehl 3). This idea of natural inequality argued by Riehl appears in literary form in

Freytag's novel. The character Karl Sturm, for example, assists Anton on the Rothsattel estate in Poland. Karl and

Anton work side by side and they are close in age, but Karl understands social difference and hierarchy better than

Anton. Karl explains why he must address Anton with his formal title, even after Anton suggests they drop the formalities:

Und was Sie soeben zu mir gesagt haben, das war freundlich gemeint, und ich danke Ihnen dafùr.

’ Fischer notes that this kind of pedagogy that puts individual needs in a secondary position was later used by totalitarian systems to manipulate people into supporting government systems that were harmful to individuals (253) . I will discuss these harmful effects below in the chapter on Reuter's novel.

67 Aber Subordination mufi sein schon wegen der andern Leute, und so wird der Herr Bevollmachtige mir schon gùtigst erlauben, dafi ich Ihnen zuerst die Hand schûttele und im ûbrigen ailes beim alten bleibt. (379, emphasis added)

Anton accepts Karl's argument, agreeing that the hierarchy

of command needs to be upheld, even though they have become

friends. This episode marks a step on Anton's way to

becoming a good German.

The "social integration" that Nancy Kaiser sees as

fundamental to the novel's structure is also central to the

structure of the family in the novel. Freytag portrays

society as a cohesive structure, and the ideal individual goal is to become integrated into that structure (Kaiser

20) . That integration begins in the family when individuals

learn their roles. It continues in increasingly larger

social groups until one recognizes one's place within the

German nation. As a boy, Anton wishes to be like his father:

"Seine groBte Freude war, dem Vater gegenüberzusitzen, die

Beinchen ûbereinander zu legen, wie der Vater tat, und aus

einem Holunderrohr zu rauchen, wie sein Herr Vater aus einer wirklichen Pfeife zu tun pflegte" (14). While on one hand it may not be unusual for children to imitate their parents, especially in "grown-up" activities such as smoking a pipe, the emphasis here is on how agreeable Anton is as a child.

68 and how he decides very early to do exactly what his father wants.

While Freytag uses Anton and the Schroter household as a positive example for the German bourgeoisie, he also presents negative examples. He sets up a parallel narrative to Anton's development in the Jewish character Veitel Itzig, who starts out on (literally) the same path as Anton: the two young men grow up in the same village, then head to the city at the same time. When they meet along the road they continue to travel together. Despite these similarities, however, their difference is emphasized as well. Veitel's clothes are more ragged than Anton's, Veitel has suffered

"MiBhandlungen mutwilliger Schuler" (23), and it seems likely that he has been abused by other people as well.

Moreover, their visions of what it means to be a businessman are markedly different. Both visions are somewhat childish, but while Anton thinks of happily selling fruit and candy,

Veitel has a darker notion. "Es gibt ein Rezept," he tells

Anton, "durch das man kann zwingen einen jeden, von dem man etwas will, auch wenn er nicht will" (24). Veitel's plans center on acquiring money, in contrast to Anton, who wishes

Anton's early desire to please his father and become a businessman is especially noteworthy when compared to the beginning of Bildunasroman Wilhelm Meisters Lehriahre. Wilhelm leaves home because he does not want to join his father's business, and does not accept his role in the middle class until the end of the novel.

69 to learn a trade. It is Veitel's single-minded guest for money that makes him the novel's villain. The novel paints capitalism as a positive force that brings order, and those who are stronger will dominate those who are weaker. But money grubbers such as Veitel are destructive to the capitalist system because, rather than work within the rules of "honest" commerce to earn a living, they seek to abuse those rules to exploit the weak.”

As a Bildunasroman the novel focuses on Anton's education and development as he learns to be a good German citizen. In order to reach this goal, Anton must learn to be a capitalist, nationalist and, eventually, patriarch. These three categories are related. Joining and playing a role in the right family is central to Anton's development into a model German citizen. Both the Schroter business and the nation follow the structure of the patriarchal family, which permits a hierarchy that appears just and natural. In the family, the business, and the nation, individuals must accept their positions— especially inferior positions— to make the larger system work. The German nation Freytag imagines cannot exist without the active participation of satisfied and loyal workers, from the soldiers who police the borders to the women who play their "proper" roles

” Assuming, that is, that anything in a capitalist system can be called "honest" commerce.

70 caring for the homes of German families. Despite the

underlying liberal-optimistic notion that any plucky young

man can make something out of himself, the only individuals

who succeed are the ones who place themselves within

traditional and orderly bourgeois families.

FATE AND FATHERS

In a novel that stresses education and individual

choices, it is remarkable that the one event that shapes

Anton's future is based on pure chance. The first few pages

of the novel describe Anton's childhood and introduce him as

a bright, lovable boy with many possibilities.

Und da der Zeichenlehrer behauptete, Anton musse Maler werden, und der Ordinarius von Tertia dem Vater riet, ihn Philologie studieren zu lassen, so ware der Knabe seiner zahlreichen Anlagen wegen wahrscheihlich in die gewohnliche Gefahr ausgezeichneter Kinder gekommen, fur keine einzige Tâtigkeit den rechten Ernst zu finden, wenn nicht ein Zufall seinen Beruf bestimmt hàtte. (14, emphasis added)

In both form and content, this one sentence tells how

Anton's life might have resulted in disorder and turmoil,

had fate not intervened. The main clause is made up of a

series of clauses, each of which builds on the previous one with heightening speed and confusion, mirroring the

confusion of making choices among all the possibilities that

face Anton. The final dependent clause is simple and

succinct: fate has decided for him.

71 Fate comes in the form of a package the Wohlfahrt family receives every Christmas from the businessman T.O.

Schroter. This package contains sugar, coffee, fruit, tobacco and other luxurious Kolonialwaren. T h e aromas from these products enhance the stories Herr Wohlfahrt tells his son about the business world, and Anton imagines that all sorts of wonderful things exist in the world of business. "Und in der Seele des Kleinen schofi augenblicklich ein hûbsches Bild zusammen, wie die Strahlen hunter

Glasperlen im Kaleidoskop, zusammengesetzt aus grofien

Zuckerhüten, Rosinen und Mandeln und goldenen Apfelsinen . .

." (15). With these thoughts, Anton agrees that he wants to be a businessman.

Fate does not act alone in bringing young Anton to this decision, but the just and orderly actions of his father play a role as well. Schroter sends the package to the

Wohlfahrt family every year out of gratitude for Wohlfahrt's help in recovering an old debt.

Vor vielen Jahren hatte der Kalkulator [Wohlfahrt] in einem bestaubten Aktenbùndel, das von den Gerichten und der Menschheit bereits aufgegeben war, ein Dokument gefunden, worin ein groBer Gutsbesitzer aus Posen erklàrte, einem bekannten Handelshause der Hauptstadt mehrere tausend Taler zu schulden. Offenbar war der Schuldschein in kriegerischer und ungesetzmàBiger Zeit in ein falsches Aktenheft verlegt worden. Er hatte den Fund am gehorigen Orte angezeigt, und das

The latent imperialism in this term becomes clearer later when Anton arrives at the Schroter business. See below.

72 Handelshaus war dadurch in den Stand gesetzt worden, einen verzweifelten Rechtsstreit gegen die Erben des Schuldners zu gewinnen. Darauf hatte der junge Chef der Handlung sich angelegentlich nach dem Finder des Dokuments erkundigt und demselben einen artigen Brief geschrieben, der Kalkulator hatte, wie seine Art war, sehr bestimmt alien Dank abgelehnt, well er nur seine Amtspflicht erfùllt habe. (14-15)

This episode, which provides the basis for Anton's career as a businessman, already outlines the core themes of the novel. Disorder threatened the stability of the Schroter business: the promissory note was put into the wrong file during "kriegerischer und ungesetzmàBiger Zeit." Berman points out that this was not fate or accident at all, explaining that this "initial event, which Freytag ironically presents as an accident, is in fact a paradigm of the realists' insistence on the presence of basic laws beneath the surface of confusion and chaos" (83) . Anton's father, the intrepid accountant, fulfills his "Amtspflicht" and returns the note to the "gehorigen Orte." Wohlfahrt is a man who respects law and order, and feels personally obligated to perform his duty and see that both are maintained.

Anton's destiny then, is shaped by two factors: the

"fate" that brought the promissory note to his father's attention and the sense of duty that prompted Wohlfahrt to give it to the authorities. Freytag dispatches Anton's parents in the first chapter after setting them up as

73 honorable members of the petty bourgeoisie. The brevity of their appearance in the novel makes it seem that their roles are of little importance other than.in providing background to Anton's life. The structure of the Wohlfahrt family, however, already contains the basic structure of a good bourgeois family. Wohlfahrt is a benevolent patriarch who is concerned with his duty, and with his son's future. Though

Anton has many talents, his father will see to it that Anton seek a practical career instead of art or philology, as his teachers suggest. Anton chooses the "right" career because he is willing to respect the structure of the patriarchal family and do exactly what his father wants.

THREE FAMILIES

In addition to the Wohlfahrt family, three other families play major roles in Anton's learning process. The bourgeois Schroter family gives Anton a home as he completes his apprenticeship, the aristocratic Rothsattel family provides him with access to the lives of the nobility, and the Jewish Ehrenthal family is set up as a group of people who have not successfully learned middle-class values. The novel presents the Schroter family as a positive example of

The impracticality of these subjects is made clear later when Anton befriends Bernhard, who studies ancient literature. Bernhard has no practical knowledge of business, but spends his time gushing about the beauty of Persian poetry.

74 the German middle class while criticizing the Rothsattels and Ehrenthals for their lack of middle class values. When

Anton leaves home, he must join another patriarchal family to continue his education as a German.

Freytag creates a business organized in the style of the nearly-extinct aanzes Haus and idealizes this form of the family. This kind of household is Riehl's goal too:

Riehl hopes for a future in which the aanzes Haus comes to the city, where the extended family includes both biological family and servants (298). Freytag's business leader

Traugott Schroter is the enlightened patriarch who firmly but fairly rules his subordinates. His elderly aunt resides with him to help with the household, and his sister Sabine supervises cooks and maids, cares for the linens and generally runs the living quarters. At the end of the novel, it is revealed that Sabine is also a silent partner in the business: she actively advises her brother, but only privately, between the two of them. As far as the employees can see, Sabine plays no role in the business. This business relationship between Sabine and her brother is similar to the ideal bourgeois marriage, since a husband is supposed to consult with his wife on weighty issues, but he alone has the final word.^

It seems a bit odd that Freytag chose to have the Schroter household run by the businessman's significantly younger sister. (Sabine is approximately ten to fifteen years

75 The relationship between Schroter and Sabine also shares similarities with a monarchy, in that a monarch may have advisors whom he consults, but he has the power to make decisions on his own. The Schroter business resembles a monarchy as well, and Fink comments ironically on this resemblance, describing Schroter among his employees as a

"Fûrst . . . unter seinen Vasallen" (52). When Anton performs his job with distinction, Schroter wishes to promote him. The head clerk explains the situation to his colleagues:

Da . . . die herkommliche Lehrzeit Wohlfahrts erst in einem . . . oder zwei Jahren zu Ende geht, so will er [Schroter] eine solche auBerordentliche Abweichung von der Ordnung nicht eintreten lassen ohne die Beistimmung des Kontors. (109)

The clerks then debate the issue. They have the power to decide on Anton's apprenticeship, but only because Schroter has given it to them. He could have just as easily made the decision without their input. The clerks finally agree with

Herr Fix, the accountant, who explains, "Es ist nicht

Ordnung, daB einer mit zwei Jahren seine Lehrzeit abmacht;

younger than Traugott, by my estimate.) Why does Traugott have no wife? The obvious answer to that question would be that Anton would not be able to marry her and therefore marry into the business if Sabine were already married. Since Traugott is obviously older and more experienced, why not give him a daughter for Anton to marry? It may be more unlikely that Sabine would be a partner in the business if she were Schroter's daughter, also making her and Anton's marriage not quite as significant, although a business owner could easily make his new son-in-law a partner after the marriage.

76 da es aber der Prinzipal wûnscht, so werde ich nicht

widersprechen, denn sein Wille mu6 zuletzt doch respektiert

werden" (110). Essentially, they agree to Anton's promotion

only because they know Schroter wants it. This episode makes

Schroter appear generous and respectful of his employees'

opinions.

All the workers at the Schroter business appear happy, content and successful. The main representative of the

German working class is the warehouse loader Sturm, a simple and slightly laughable character. He is the largest and

strongest of the warehouse workers, earning him the title of

"der Riese." His son Karl is of average height, but Sturm treats him like a dwarf who will never be able to fend for himself. Sturm is a hard-working man, though how he manages to save a small fortune during his lifetime remains a mystery. While Freytag portrays the workers at the Schroter business in a rosy and optimistic manner, his portrayal of the masses is equally unrealistic. He has no sympathy for the Polish peasants Anton encounters, who are all depicted as lazy, dishonest and dirty.

In less stark but still clear parallels, the aristocratic Rothsattels and the Jewish Ehrenthals portray the failure to achieve the success of the Schroter family.

Baron von Rothsattel fails to cope with the changing economy and loses the bulk of his estate in speculation. Horst

77 Ehrenthal begins to lose his sanity after the death of his

son, and he loses his money to Veitel Itzig in a failed land

deal. Freytag uses these families to portray people who fail

in business and as Germans. Their primary problem lies in

their inadequate family structure. Itzig and Ehrenthal work

only out of greed, rather than for the good of a larger

group. Their failures in business and as citizens are linked

to the lack of proper family structure, because it is in a

family that individuals learn to play their (subordinate)

roles and learn a group identity. Acceptance of one's role

is important in developing a strong group, be it family or nation.

The descriptions of the Rothsattel family imply that the aristocracy is a thing of the past. The illustrious history of the house of Rothsattel opens the chapter in which the baron is first introduced, leaving the impression that his family history is more important than what he has done himself. Baron von Rothsattel is pleased that his family "ist eine der altesten" (221) . He is decorated by the king, not for an act of bravery or service to the state, but for his family. "Der Konig hat die Huld gehabt, mir den

Orden zu verleihen, den der Vater und GroBvater getragen haben; es freut mich, daB das Kreuz in unserer Familie fast erblich wird," (221) he tells his wife and daughter.

78 The aristocracy's emphasis on lineage becomes laughable when Fink tries to bring Anton along to dance lessons with a group of young men and women of the nobility. First, Fink tries to introduce Anton on his own merits, telling his hostess, Frau von Baldereck, "Er selbst ist der bescheidenste und bravste Mann, der mir je vorgekommen, er ist hier aus einer Ecke der Provins, aus Ostrau, der Sohn eines verstobenen Beamten" (120). This introduction as the hard-working son of honest folk, however, is not enough for

Anton to gain acceptance in aristocratic circles. Fink takes matters into his own hands; he has already transferred a small piece of barren beach property in New York into

Anton's name, and he tells his hostess that Anton has inherited property abroad. Then he cleverly insinuates that

Anton might be the bastard son of nobility.

"Haben Sie von den verstorbenen Groôfùrsten; hier nebenbei, gekannt?" Fink wies mit der Hand bedeutsam nach irgendeiner Himmelsgegend. "Nein," sagte die gnàdige Frau, neugierig. "Es gibt Leute," fuhr Fink fort, "welche behaupten, daB Anton ihm sprechend àhnlich sieht. Was ich Ihnen sage, ist ubrigens mein Geheimnis, mein Freund selbst lebt in vollstandiger Unkenntnis aller dieser Beziehungen, durch welche moglicherweise seine Zukunft bestimmt werden kann. Bekannt ist nur der Umstand, daB der verstorbene Kaiser bei seiner letzten Reise durch diese Provinz in Ostrau angehalten und sich langere Zeit mit dem Geistlichen des Ortes leise und angelegentlich unterhalten hat." . . . Frau von Baldereck . . . war durch diese perfiden Andeutungen in eine gewisse neugierige Stimmung gebracht, sie erklàrte sich bereit, Herrn Wohlfahrt in ihrem Hause zu empfangen. (120)

79 Fink is pleased that his plan has worked, and Anton will be accepted in this society, but is disgusted that he had to resort to lies for them to respect an honest person. As he leaves, he mutters to himself, "Als ehrlicher Leute Kind ware der arme Junge von ihnen über die Achseln angesehen worden. Jetzt glauben sie zu wissen, dafi irgendein fremder

Potentat, vor dem zu kriechen sie für eine Ehre halten, an dem Jungen Anteil nimmt" (121).

Indeed, Fink is the only aristocrat who receives sympathetic portrayal, and this is only because of his willingness to learn from the bourgeois businessmen around him. Fink is something of a renegade who has lived wildly, travelled around the world, and finally decided that he should learn about business. He is employed voluntarily at the Schroter business because his father, who has already made the transition from idle landowner to businessman, has sent him there to learn. Fink is an example of a member of the aristocracy who has been able to learn about the economic and social changes going on in the world, and he has been able to adapt to them. The impending marriage between him and Lenore von Rothsattel at the end of the novel signals a new role for the aristocracy if they are willing to change.

The first view of the Ehrenthal family together is not a good one. Veitel Itzig arrives in the city and goes to the

80 Ehrenthal house, which seems disreputable from the first glance. After making Veitel wait in the dirty stairway outside the apartment while the family eats dinner,

Ehrenthal discusses the terms of their business relationship, then calls for the family to come meet the new employee. But they are not there to welcome him; rather, they look upon his ragged clothing with derision. Even though Ehrenthal's office is in his house, and his family sometimes meets his clients, he keeps business matters separate from his family. While he clearly loves his family and wishes to provide for them, he does not involve them in his work. Frau Ehrenthal seems to know nothing of her husband's business.^" Anton wonders if Bernhard works with his father in the business.

"Ach nein" erwiderte Bernhard, diesen übelstand entschuldingend, "ich habe studiert, und da einem jungen Mann von meiner Konfession die Anstellung im Staate nicht leicht wird, und ich in meiner Familie leben kann, so beschàftige ich mich mit diesen Bûchern." (184)

Despite this mild criticism of a society that does not allow an intelligent young man to choose an appropriate profession, Freytag still seems to criticize Bernhard for his concentration on the esoteric and his inability to do

Her separation from the business contrasts with Sabine's careful keeping of accounts, since Sabine is a silent partner in her brother's business. Historically, however, it seems more likely that the Jewish wife was closely involved in the family business (Kaplan, Jewish 51).

81 anything practical. "Bernhards Tàtigkeit auf diesem Gebiet

ist eine Art Flucht von der Realitat" (Gelber, "Umwelt"

42) Indeed, Bernhard has little contact with the real

world, and this is made clear when he and Anton discuss

taking lessons together. Anton is immediately concerned with

the fee their tutor will charge, but Bernhard reacts as if

the thought never occurred to him. His father takes care of

all the financial dealings in the house, and Bernhard knows

nothing about money.

The most striking example of the importance of families

in this novel appears in the different receptions Anton and

Itzig meet in the homes where they plan to become

apprentices. These opposite receptions affect the direction

of their lives from the time they arrive in the city. Upon

Anton's arrival, Traugott Schroter welcomes him into the

business. Anton's simple room contains furniture that is old

but nonetheless clean and well-kept. More importantly, he

feels like he belongs— like he has arrived home: "er hatte

jetzt ein Heimat, er gehorte in das Geschàft" (36) . His task on his first day of work involves copying letters, which is appropriate work for an entry-level clerk.

It is also a flight from his roots. Bernhard is the only Jew portrayed in a sympathetic manner. His distance from his family gives him an air of respectability in Freytag's eyes.

82 The business and the household are hierarchically organized, and he is at the bottom of that hierarchy, as is made clear by his place at the dinner table. He does, however, feels comfortable in his place.

Alle Herren des Kontors, welche nicht verheiratet waren, wohnten in seinem [Schroters] Hause, gehorten seinem Haushalte an, und afien alle Mittage Punkt ein Uhr an dem Tisch des Prinzipals .... Anton erhielt seinen Platz am Ende einer langen Tafel, zwischen den jùngsten seiner Kollegen. Ihm gerade gegenûber sa6 Sabine, neben dieser ihr Bruder, auf der andern Seite die Verwandte, neben dieser Herr Fink, und dahinter alle ûbrigen genau nach Rang und Alter im Geschàft. (50-51)

All quietly and respectfully take part in dinner and seem to be pleased and satisfied to be able to complete their duties. The clerks with whom Anton works have made a small family of their own, complete with petty bickering, mild misunderstandings and happy reconciliation. Even when the clerks are not at work, however, the clear hierarchy continues: Anton must serve tea to the senior clerks in addition to performing his duties in the office. It is this sense of order that the novel presents as the key to good society. The unity produced by this togetherness helps the workers envision the common goal of successful business. If they all feel like they belong in the family of the company, they will all feel a personal stake in its success or failure. Where order is lacking, trouble begins: "Its [the novel's] villains are evil not because they have basic moral

83 failings but because they are carriers of disorder and disorderly modes of vision” (Berman, Rise 81-2).

Veitel Itzig, in contrast to Anton, never bonds with a group, and never learns to become a subordinate in that group. He receives no cordial welcome at his arrival in the city. Ehrenthal sends Veitel away, instructing him to return the next day, forcing him to seek lodging at a disreputable and dingy boarding house, where he will come in contact only with unsavory characters. His first job in the Ehrenthal house is polishing their shoes, which is a job for a servant. Rather than becoming a part of and working for the good of a larger entity like family, company or nation,

Itzig learns early that he has only himself to trust, and any gains he makes are only for himself. In this way, he misses what Riehl would call the most important lesson one can learn from a family.

Im Hause allein aber kann bei uns das Volk den Geist der Autoritat und Pietat gewinnen, im Hause kann es lernen, wie Zucht und Freiheit miteinander gehen, wie das Individuum sich opfern mu6 für eine hohere moralische Gesamtpersonlichkeit— die Familie. Und im Staatsleben, obgleich es auf eine andere Idee als die Familie gebaut ist, wird man die Früchte dieser Schule des Hauses ernten. (Riehl 130)

Riehl and Freytag see the household and family as the place where individuals learn order, morality and loyalty to a group. The patriarchal-hierarchical family prepares the individual for a life in that kind of nation or state.

84 COLONIALISM

The idea of capitalism provides the justification for competition among nations, classes and races. A basic tenet of capitalism is that competition is necessary to maintain product quality and fair pricing. Weak and inefficient businesses will be consumed by stronger businesses, and this consolidation is supposed to be good for the economy and for the consumer. On a national level, weak nations will be conquered by stronger nations. According to Schroter,

Germans should dominate in Poland because the German middle class has the stronger ethic and can lead better.

The idea of colonialism provides an underlying theme in the novel. Schroter's Kolonialwarenaeschaft could not exist without European domination of the world. Early in his employment at the Schroter company, Anton is impressed by the internationalism of the storeroom: "Fast alle Lander der

Erde, alle Rassen der Menschengeschlechts hatten gearbeitet und eingesammelt, urn Nùtzliches und Wertvolles vor den Augen unseres Helden zusammenzutùrmen . . ." (53). What Anton views as internationalism, however, is actually the exploitation of the pre-industrial world by European colonialism. This exploitation becomes glaring to the modern reader when the narrator mentions the people who actually made the products. The scene is described in rosy terms of people all over the world being connected to this room full

85 of goods. But the Hindu woman who wove the rugs probably earned a mere pittance for her labor, and the "Neger aus

Kongo" who "im Dienst des virginischen Pflanzers" (53) packed cotton into a crate is most likely a slave who was forcibly taken from his home in the Congo to work in

Virginia. Anton's (and the narrator's) rosy view of how international cooperation brings wonderful products to this storeroom is callously one-sided.

The novel's colonialism is not limited to mysterious far-off places. Anton's friend Fink refers to Poland as a

"slawischen Sahara" (479). While Freytag wrote Soil und

Haben. exploration of northern Africa was receiving attention. This was only one generation after René Caillié became the first European to reach Timbuktu and live to tell about it, and at the same time as Heinrich Barth's travels in West Africa.’^ Many explorers (including some of Barth's companions) did not survive their travels, reinforcing the image of Africa as wild and uncivilized territory. Fink's metaphor emphasizes a colonial view of Poland, since African

The French paid little attention to Caillié's journey, but the British press lauded his feat. The book he published in 1830 was well received in Great Britain. Barth went to Africa as a geographer for the British government and stayed from 1849 to 1855. His five-volume travelogue was not published until 1857, but during his journey he sent reports that were printed in the German press (Gramont 157, 217-230) . It seems reasonable to assume that Freytag may have been aware of this exploration.

86 territory was widely viewed as open to domination by

Europeans who were "obviously” superior to Africans.

Anton's travels in Poland provide experiences he would

not have in Prussia. He witnesses a chaotic revolution,

widespread poverty and an alarming lack of work ethic. The

novel's mix of racism and classism come to the fore when

Schroter explains to Anton what is wrong with Poland.

Es gibt keine Rasse, welche so wenig das Zeug hat, vorwartszukommen, und sich durch ihre Kapitalien Menschlichkeit und Bildung zu erwerben, als die slawische. Was die Leute dort im MüBiggang durch den Druck der stupiden Masse zusammengebracht haben, vergeuden sie in phantastischen Spielereien. Bei uns tun so etwas doch nur einzelne bevorzugte Klassen, und die Nation kann es zur Not ertragen. Dort drùben erheben dies Privilegierten den Anspruch, das Volk darzustellen. Als wenn Edelleute und leibeigene Bauern einen Staat bilden konnten! (254)

The middle class, according to Schroter, provides the morality, order and work ethic a nation needs to progress

and improve itself. For this reason, he concludes, Germans are entitled (and perhaps even have a responsibility) to dominate the Poles in order to bring them progress. The

Poland episodes provide a contrast to the orderly life Anton experiences in the Schroter household. The only members of the middle class that the novel shows in Poland are Germans.

The narrator describes the history of the town of Rosmin,

founded and settled by German merchants and tradesmen.

So war Rosmin entstanden, so viele deutsche Stadte auf altem Slawengrund, und die sind geblieben, was sie im Anfang waren, die Markte der grofien Ebene,

87 die Stàtten, wo polnische Ackerfrucht eingetauscht wird gegen die Erfindungen deutscher Industrie, die Knoten eines festen Netzes, welches der Deutsche über den Slawen gelegt hat, kunstvolle Knoten, in denen zahllose Fàden zusammenlaufen, durch welche die kleinen Arbeiter des Feldes verbunden werden mit andern Menschen, mit Bildung, mit Freiheit und einem zivilisierten Staat. (447)

The metaphor of the "net" has both positive and negative implications. The metaphor invokes an image of captivity, in which the Germans have forced their way of life on the

Slavs. It is described here, however, in terms of the progress in trade and economy the Germans bring to the

Slavs: the poor, backward Slavs have been saved by the industrious Germans.

Indeed, the only good, honest workers Anton encounters in Poland are German. On Anton's second trip to Poland, when he goes to oversee the Rothsattel estate, he and his assistant Karl are appalled at the condition of the estate: the manager has stolen furniture and other goods from the property, the buildings are in ruin, the fields lie fallow and the animals are sickly. Among all the disrepair and neglect on the estate, they are surprised to see one building with a newly repaired roof, an orderly garden and a woman with children looking out the window. Karl quickly assesses the situation, and understands why this house is different. "Hurra!" he cries. "Hier ist eine Hausfrau, hier ist Vaterland, hier sind Deutsche!" (392). The order of the

88 household run by this good German housewife extends outside

of her home to the rest of her part of the estate.

THE BÜRGER TAKES A WIFE

Perhaps the most important relationship in the family

is that between husband and wife. In Freytag's world, the

kind of woman a bourgeois man marries is important to the

kind of family he will have, because he will depend on her

to run his household. Both the physical and spiritual

condition of the house depend on the actions of the wife.

"Das innerste Leben des Hauses, sein individueller Charakter wird fast immer bestimmt durch die Frau" (Riehl 21). Barbara

Becker-Cantarino has examined the importance of finding the

right wife for a bourgeois man and sees a similar element in

Goethe's Hermann und Dorothea. Hermann chooses Dorothea (who

is financially destitute but promises to be a "tüchtige

Hausfrau") over a frivolous young heiress (Becker-Cantarino

528). In Soil und Haben. Anton also needs a wife to run the household and keep it in respectable order.

Like Hermann, Anton has more than one woman from which to choose. Early in the novel he meets Lenore, daughter of the Baron von Rothsattel. Lenore is lovely and exciting, and in their ensuing encounters, Anton finds her increasingly attractive. It eventually becomes obvious, however, that she is not the one for him. Not only is she an aristocrat, and

89 therefore ill-equipped to run a bourgeois household, but, as

Mark Grunert argues, she represents wild and uncivilized nature. Like the uncontrolled greed represented by Itzig and

Ehrenthal, Lenore's wild and natural characteristics threaten bourgeois order.

Lenore entzieht sich alien seinen Domestizierungs- versuchen und zeigt nur wenig Intéressé für die Arbeit im Haushalt oder die Kunst der Buchführung, die Anton ihr beizubringen versucht; sie reitet lieber aus oder arbeitet "einen Hobel in der Hand" wie ein Mann, an einem neuen Schlitten. (Grunert 139)

Grunert points to the Schlittenmàrchen episode in which

Anton rides with Lenore in her sleigh. The very sight of

Lenore driving and Anton standing on the runners behind her’® appears inappropriate in bourgeois circles, especially when compared to a scene in which Sabine Schroter travels in an open carriage with her brother and several employees. Great, care is given to a "proper" seating arrangement; Sabine and her brother sit facing forward, and the two men receiving the honor of riding with their employer and his sister sit facing them. Sabine discards the correct arrangement only when the gentleman seated across from her becomes ill from riding backwards. This scene stresses her benevolence and her willingness to defy

’® This event repeats an earlier scene in which Anton and Lenore meet for the first time. They get in a small boat and Lenore rows them across the lake (22).

90 convention— not for her own pleasure, but for the good of

others.

Freytag portrays Lenore as a strong young woman who is

in control: "[Sie] trieb ihr Pferd mit kràftigem Zuruf an"

(415) . Sabine, on the other hand, very correctly sits in a

carriage that is driven by servants (200) . When Fink and

Anton drill their troops in maneuvers, Lenore wishes to join

them. Anton is appalled at the suggestion, calling Lenore's

behavior "unweiblich" (what he means by "weiblich" is

domestic). Later, revolutionary Poles attack the

Rothsattel's estate, and Lenore wants to stay with Anton and

the defending troops so she will not miss any of the action.

While this wish exhibits, to a certain extent, a selfless

desire to help the community, it also displays her lack of

propriety. Anton sends Lenore inside, where she can properly

help her mother. Sabine would never have had the audacity to

ride with the soldiers, and she would have instinctively

known where she belonged in this situation.

Since Lenore has little use for her "domestic duties,"

a union between her and Anton would be impossible in the world Freytag creates in Soil und Haben. Sabine Schroter, however, will make a perfect and proper wife. She is almost a caricature of the domestic woman. The first time Anton

(and the reader) encounter(s) her, Freytag emphasizes her domesticity: "Sie war nicht alter als Anton, aber sie hatte

91 die Wùrde und Haltung einer Hausfrau” (51). She oversees the household for her brother and seems to spend more time on her impeccable linens than she does on personal relationships. Sabine's obsession with the household linens signals her fitness for the role of a bourgeois wife who pays close attention to the details of managing the household. The Schroters are financially secure, but not obscenely wealthy. Even though they can afford some servants, it is the housewife's duty to oversee the housework and do the more delicate work herself.

Sabine, at least, lives in a comfortable household and has servants to help her with the daily duties. A woman in this situation can expend much energy on the admirable task of maintaining the linens, since she does not need to invest all her time in the daily household work of cooking, cleaning or making clothing. This obsession with work that only maintains appearances was not uncommon for bourgeois women of the time. Tablecloths and napkins, for example, required perfect presentation when entertaining. "Bis ins

Detail muBte der Nachweis eines geregelten Familienlebens und einer geordneten Hauslichkeit erbracht werden; verantwortlich dafür war die Ehefrau" (Meyer, Theater 18-

19). Not only did the household need smooth management, it needed to be evident to the public that the household was in order. For women of the lower-middle class, however.

92 appearances were even more important, argues Meyer, because

they did not want their lack of finances to seem to affect

their lives.

Since a bourgeois woman's life at this time centers on

the household, the best she has to offer comes from the

household. Her linens, which are part of her trousseau, play

a large role in her life, so she needs to care for them

(Meyer, Theater 118). She will use them for the rest of her

life.

A pillow dolled up with lace, sheets artfully embroidered: these, too, were articles that enhanced a lady's beauty. On them she would experience the excitement of the wedding night and the birth of her children. Along with a woman's body linen, her household linen accompanied her and served her in her feminine duties, in bed, at the dressing table, and while dining. (Kniebiehler 331)

As part of her trousseau, her linens also represent a very personal part of her life.

If linens play such a role in a woman's trousseau, it explains the significance of a gesture that Sabine makes toward Anton. While Anton and Schroter are in Poland retrieving their seized goods, they are attacked by vagabonds and Anton bravely defends his wounded employer.

Later, when Anton returns home to the Schroter household,

Sabine oversees the readying of his room, and supplies curtains, pillows and bedcovers that she has sewn and

93 embroidered herself. Her aunt finds this act extremely

inappropriate:

Aber es sind ja die gestickten Vorhange, die du aufgezogen hast. Die gehoren doch nicht ins Hinterhaus, in diese Herrenwirtschaft .... Und die überzûge, und diese Handtucher, das ist unerhort, es sind ja deine besten Stùcke. Mein Gotti (321)

Even though Sabine generally oversees the furnishing and

laundry in the household, she goes beyond her normal duties here. The extra act of this young, unmarried woman personally preparing Anton's bed has some sexual

implications, which is why her aunt finds it so scandalous.

It is clear from this gesture that Sabine sees Anton as an important part of her life.

Sabine's linens also link her to Anton's mother, further reinforcing the image of the good, honest housewife.

The first information given about Anton's mother involves her laundry:

Endlich begab es sich, daB die Frau Kalkulatorin^’ ihre weiBbaumwollene Bettgardine mit einer breiten Krause und zwei groBen Quasten verzierte und unter der hochsten Billigung aller Freundinnen auf einige Wochen dahinter verschwand, gerade nachdem sie die letzte Faite zurechtgestrichen und sich ùberzeugt hatte, daB die Gardine von untadelhafter Wasche war. Hinter der weiBen Gardinen wurde der Held dieser Erzahlung geboren. (13)

The narrator never refers to Anton's mother by name, but only calls her "die Frau Kalkulatorin."

94 This passage implies that Frau Wohlfahrt could not give birth to her son until the setting was in perfect order.

Frau Wohlfahrt performs her two most important duties as a

German wife: giving birth to a son and keeping the linens

(and household) in perfect condition.

Becker-Cantarino's description of a woman's role in the aanzes Haus. according to the Hausvaterliterator of the eighteenth century, match Sabine's responsibilities.

Die Tugenden [der Hausfrau] waren Rechtschaffenheit, gutes Herz und gesunde Vernunft; die Pflichten standen darin, umganglich im Hause, aber zurùckhaltend zu sein, hàuslichen Fle-iô, Reinlichkeit und allseitige Fàhigkeiten im Haushalt (sprich: Arbeit) zu leisten. (Becker- Cantarino 510)

Sabine, however, appears to do little in the household other than obsessively care for her linens. While Freytag gives detailed descriptions of the daily activities of the business, he ignores the activity in the household. A woman in charge of a large household has many responsibilities, as

Sabine no doubt doe$ in this family. Freytag repeatedly refers to the cleanliness and order in the house, which implies that someone is working hard to keep it clean and orderly. Why does Freytag not tell more about what she does?

Her work is supposed to be invisible, according to the ideology of "conspicuous leisure," which "required that housework be viewed as the expression of love and devotion rather than as labor" (Boxer & Quataert 157). Riehl also

95 comments on the work women do, claiming, "Sie sollen wirken

fur das offentliche Leben, aber man soil ihrer dabei nicht

ansichtig werden, denn sie sollen zu Hause bleiben" (10).

Sabine's role as a silent partner is like her role in the

household: though closely involved in all aspects of the

house and business, she cannot be publicly acknowledged for

that involvement. Schroter's comment that Sabine is "die

gute Fee, welche den Haushalt in Ordnung halt" (51) reveals

a certain truth: like the activity of a fairy, the work of a

housewife needs to remain unseen. It cannot seem that she

works, rather that she somehow works magic. Her labor,

however, is essential in keeping the household in

respectable order.

The Ehrenthal women, in contrast to Sabine, do not

manage the household in an upstanding manner. The

description of Veitel's first view of the Ehrenthal house

tells much about the people who live there.

Die untern Fenster waren durch Eisenstàbe vergittert, im ersten Stockwerk glànzten die weiBen Rahmen, welche groBe Spiegelscheiben einfaBten, unter dem Dach waren die Fenster blind, schmutzig, hier und da eine Scheibe zerschlagen. Es war kein guter Charakter in dem Hause, wie eine alte Zigeunerin sah es aus, die ùber ihr bettelhaftes Kostùm ein neues buntes Tuch geworfen hat .... Die unsaubere Treppe fùhrte zu einer weiBlackierten Entreetür, auf welcher in groBem Messingschild der Name 'Hirsch Ehrenthal' zu lesen war. (39)

There has been an unsatisfactory attempt to cover the dirt

and shabbiness in this house. The living quarters of the

96 house are luxurious, but the rest has been ignored. The door

at the top of the stairs is significantly painted white,

instead of simply being a white door. This use of the word

weiBlackiert emphasizes the white covering over the

otherwise common (and probably dirty) door. The ostentation

of the door with the brass name plate sticks out

incongruously in the dirty stairway. Even the living

guarters are dirty underneath, as Rothsattel notices when he

comes to do business with Ehrenthal.

Der Freiherr . . . sah . . . ùber die auffallenden Farben der bunten Vorhange, den roten Plüsche des Sofas, den unsaubern FuBboden und die zahlreichen schlechten olbilder an den Wanden, dicke Farbenmassen, welche wahrscheinlich aus dem Trodel gekauft waren und schwarzlichen Baumschlag aus irgeneinem unreinlichen Weltteil darstellten. (167)

Rothsattel's observation betrays his own snobbery, but it

also reveals something about this family: Frau Ehrenthal and

her daughter Rosalie are more concerned with dress, fashion

and surface appearances than with the basic Ordnuna und

Reinlichkeit of their home. Rosalie has the time to learn

and play a "neues Modestùck" on the "kostbaren Flügel" (187)

that the Ehrenthals own, but little time to oversee the

proper management of their home. As discussed above, the women of a family are responsible for the physical upkeep of the house. Frau Ehrenthal and her daughter clearly fail (in

Freytag's eyes) in their jobs as housekeepers. Even though they have servants to do the heavy housework, it is the

97 responsibility of the ladies of the house to oversee that the work is done properly, just as Sabine Schroter manages her household.

The poor management of the Ehrenthal household is reflected in the poor management of the Ehrenthal business.

The connection between the two transcends the imaginary division between public and private. In the Schroter home, the order and moral code of the private sphere extends beyond the house into the business, while in the Ehrenthal home, the crass materialism and lack of order extend into the business, which eventually leads to its failure.

CONCLUSION

Soil und Haben presents an interesting contradiction in its view of human possibility. On one hand, it holds the liberal-optimistic, Horatio-Alger-type view that any young man with a little luck and a lot of hard work can succeed in the world. Anton is a young man of humble origins who climbs the business ladder to a respectable position.^® Early in the novel, Fink compares his aristocratic background to

Anton's, and suggests .that they each have equal opportunities: "übrigens ist es ziemlich gleichgülting, in

Jeffrey Sammons points out that the "narrower polarity" of this success story, compared to Alger's novels, "clearly reflects the still enduring contrast between the relatively rigid and stratified society of Germany, and the greater fluidity in the United States, in both fact and fancy" (194) .

98 welchem Nest einer aufwàchst, man kann fast unter alien

Umstanden ein tûchtiger Gesell werden" (81) . By the end of the novel, however, it is clear that it does indeed matter

"in welchem Nest einer aufwachst," since no one who does not grow up in a good bourgeois, patriarchal family succeeds.

Bernhard Ehrenthal dies from pneumonia, Hirsch Ehrenthal goes bankirupt and insane, Veitel Itzig drowns, the Baron von

Rothsattel is blind, the Baroness is dead, and the

Rothsattels' only son Eugen was killed battling the Poles, so the family name ends with their generation.

Fritz von Fink and Lenore von Rothsattel succeed only because they let themselves be influenced by Anton. Fink has learned bourgeois morality and work ethic, while Lenore has learned bourgeois gender roles. By the end of the novel Fink finally decides to stay in one place, so he purchases the

Rothsattel estate in Poland and plans to stay there and make the estate profitable again. To do this, he needs a wife.

When Fink proposes to Lenore, she responds sadly, "Ich soil deine Hausfrau werden” (630). Her response clearly indicates that she is expecting a bourgeois marriage, and even though she has some reservations about it, she will accept it. They will become model Germans, just like Anton.

Freytag portrays the family as a training ground for individuals who will take their places in the nation. The kind of family he portrays will create individuals who are

99 willing to play subordinate roles, not question the status quo, and respect hierarchy. These people will be ready to take their place in a nation-state that requires their loyalty and obedience. This vision of the nation raises the question of how that kind of nation-state will in turn affect that family.

100 CHAPTER 4

AUS GUTER FAMILIE AS CRITICISM OF DOMESTIC NATIONALISM

INTRODUCTION

Gabriele Reuter's novel Aus outer Famille (1895) appeared forty years after the publication of Soil und

Haben. In those forty years, the political map of Germany had changed. Germany was no longer only an idea shared only by nationalist reformers: the numerous German states had been unified into a single German national state. Freytag's novel was a prescription for the development of German traits and organization of the German nation. That prescription centered on a notion of individual achievement combined with a respect for hierarchy. The individual learns in the patriarchal family to play a subordinate role in that hierarchy. The unification of Germany by Prussia resulted in a nation-state dominated by an inflexible Prussian bureaucracy and a monarchy only minimally controlled by parliament. In the setting of this regime, Reuter's novel raises some critical questions on what the reality of unification brought.

1 0 1 Reuter expresses her criticism through the perspective

of the novel's protagonist. Agathe Heidling is an

intelligent and sensitive young bourgeois woman who tries to

follow her family's wishes despite her own desires. The

internal struggle brought about by the tension between her

desires for independence and her duty to follow her parents'

wishes provides a central conflict in the novel. This

struggle appears through a blending of the perspective of

the third-person, external narrator and an internal

narrative from Agathe herself. Romantic notions of love and

happiness, learned from novels and whispered confidences

with girlfriends, clash with the reality of a world in which

she is subjected to the rule of her father.

The novel spans Agathe's adult years from her

confirmation when she is seventeen, which indicates that she has reached a marriageable age, to her final end as a

spiritually defeated "alte Jungfer." As the novel's title

indicates, Agathe grows up in a good middle-class family.

Ernst Heidling, her father, is a civil servant, and her brother Walter is an army officer. Agathe expects to marry and become a mother, but is repeatedly thwarted in her efforts to meet a potential husband. Despite a desire for

independent life, she is unable to break away from the domination of her family. She is controlled both directly by her parents and indirectly through her own inability to

1 02 overcome her socialization. Ultimately, a dramatic act of rebellion is treated as mental illness, and the "cure” renders her docile and stupid. Wilhelmine Germany has no place for women like Agathe.

Aus outer Famille has commonly been read as a criticism of the destructive force that patriarchal family structure has on women. Early feminist reviewers seized the novel and its heroine as an example of the fate of "tausende von jungen Madchen," and used it to further their cause and improve opportunities for women. Laura Marholm wrote in

1896:

Ein Buch fur Manner ist es nicht. Denn es handelt fast ausschlie&lich von den Leiden des Weibes, die der Mann, der Mann ist, nicht sieht, nicht sehen will, nicht sehen kann. Erstens, well sie ihm gleichgiltig [sic] sind, zweitens, well sie ihm langweilig sind .... Agathe ist ein ganz gewohnliches und in "guter Familie" typisches junges Mâdchen. Sie denkt nichts, sie fühlt nichts, sie will nichts ausgepragt, sie macht auf Niemanden einen ausgepragten Eindruck, — wenn man eigentlich die Summe ihres Lebens ziehen soil, so ist es die: sie verschwindet unter den Anderen. Erlebnisse hat sie nicht .... (223-224)

Agathe's education and upbringing have denied her an independent existence. Marholm stresses that Agathe's lack of existence is not a fluke, but the result of a social system that allows women no personal growth. Richard

Johnson, the first post-World War II critic to seriously study Reuter's work, focuses on the destructive power of patriarchy in families in a 1980 article.

103 But the criticism in Reuter's novel goes beyond "men's

power over women," to cite the title of Johnson's article,

in the family, and links the power structure in the family

to the hierarchy of civil society and the state. Agathe's

father dominates her life with little regard for her

desires, but outside the family, he has little power. Even

Agathe and her mother, who are clearly victimized by a

system that gives the male head of the family control over them, have almost absolute authority over their household

servants. This hierarchy within the household is a close

facsimile of the Prussian bureaucracy, in which Ernst

Heidling holds a position. Reuter's criticism thus joins the seemingly separate spheres of family and state.

Despite her engagement with topics that critics in the late twentieth century identify as feminist issues and the attention she received from feminist reformers of her own time, Reuter cautiously distanced herself from organized feminism. In her autobiography she claims that writing Aus outer Familie had nothing to do with a political movement:

"An irgendeine Tendenz dachte ich nicht — von der

Frauenbewegung hatte ich wenig gehort, und das Wenige war mir nicht sonderlich sympathisch" (434). Thomas Mann writes about a conversation with her in which they made fun of

Frauenrechtlerinnen. Reuter's biographer, Faranak Alimadad-

Mensch suggests, "Ein Grund fur diese übertriebene

104 Unkenntnisbeteuerung mag in der Notwendigkeit liegen, die

Einordnung des Romans als Tendenzverk zurückzuweisen" (116).

Although her autobiography claims otherwise, Reuter was aware of and involved in women's organizations and actively fought for the improvement of women's lives. Her numerous novels on women's issues bear testimony to her concern for the position of women in society.' Despite her claims that her work was not political, critics still debated whether

Aus outer Familie should be regarded as "only" a

Tendenzroman.^ Reuter's claim that portraying realistic situations is not a political act fits with Theodor

Fontane's theory that a novel should tell a story "an die wir glauben," and should make "eine Welt der Fiktion" appear as "eine Welt der Wirklichkeit.” Reuter's novel, however, goes beyond being simply a "Bild der Zeit."

Realism meant, for Reuter, the quest for truth, the ability to analyze social conventions, and the freedom to go beyond bourgeois limitations. It was a form of social criticism, a naturalistic exposé of the middle-class milieu, not merely a description of reality. (Johnson, "Gabriele Reuter" 228)

‘ In Das Tranenhaus (1909) she addresses the issue of unmarried women having children and the problems they face. Frau Bürqerlin und ihre Sohne (1899) and Tochter (1927) also focus on the lives of women who head their families and cope with the responsibilities of parenthood on their own.

^ For a detailed outline of the novel's early reception, see Alimadad-Mensch 116-121.

105 This criticism central to her novel makes it easy for some

of her work to be labelled tendential.

Aus outer Familie was indeed in danger of being viewed

as a specific kind of Tendenzroman, a Frauenroman. Reuter's

claim that the novel is not about "only" women's issues, that she was interested in portraying the "Tragik des

Alltags," and that the important issue of the novel is "das

Menschliche" fVom Kinde 432, 434) has not been seriously studied by critics. Her need to defend the topic of her novel comes from a tendency in literary criticism to view women's issues as relevant to only a minority of the population, a subset of a social group. The title of Ernst

Heilborn's article "Frauenantworten auf Frauenfragen" implies that the issues raised in Reuter's novel are relevant only to women. This tendency toward reductionism misses a significant point: women do not make up a social group, and women are not a minority.

Es gibt also eine Diskrepanz zwischen dem reduktionistischen Moment, das in die Fragestellung stillschweigend eingeht und das nur scheinbar das Weibliche in der Theorie aufwertet, und der Tatsache, daB es sich beim weiblichen Geschlecht um die Halfte der Menschheit handelt. (Bovenschen, Imaainierte 21)

A novel that focuses on how a society, with the legal support of the state, oppresses one half of its population can hardly be called apolitical. The criticism in Aus outer

106 Familie is directed at all segments of society that support

that oppression.

POLITICS AND FAMILY

Despite Reuter's claims to the contrary, the situation

she portrays in Aus outer Familie has powerful political

overtones. Feminists have long identified the link between male power within the family and male dominance in larger

society, as Kate Millet argued in her groundbreaking study

Sexual Politics (1969). First defining patriarchy as an

"institution whereby that half of the populace which is female is controlled by that half which is male" (25),

Millet continues: "Patriarchy's chief institution is the family. It is both a mirror of and a connection with the larger society; a patriarchal unit within the patriarchal whole" (33) . One aspect of this connection manifested itself in the nineteenth century in state laws (created and enforced by men) that gave men legal power over their wives and daughters. The Biirgerliches Gesetzbuch of 1896 updated the century-old laws of the Prussian Allgemeines Landrecht, expanding opportunities for unmarried women, who could now own property, sign contracts and conduct commercial transactions (Allen 138). The laws regarding married women, however, did not change, since a husband still controlled

107 most of his wife's property (S 1365),^ had the final word in

all decisions regarding their children (S 1634), and could

nullify any contract his wife signed (S 1396).

These laws were drafted and enforced by the men whose

positions of political power depended on the order

established by the patriarchal institution of the family.

The newly formed German state, invoking the allegedly

natural community of the German nation, depended on the

hierarchy of power that began in the family. "In Aus outer

Familie Reuter shows the father exerting absolute power over

his wife and daughter in the interest of

'Herrschaftsabsicherung'— his own as well as that of the

state" (Rahaman 462) . The men in the Heidling family— civil

servant and army officer— represent the state and the

nation, which, for all practical purposes, are one and the

same for the government and people of the Reich.

Having used the popular sentiment for national unification to join the independent German states into a

consolidated empire, Prussian leaders emphasized the national aspects of the Reich. Walker Connor suggests that

^ Personal effects, such as household items that belonged to a woman before her marriage, as well as clothing and jewelry, were a woman's private property, and her husband could not legally demand them (§ 1365-1366). A married woman also controlled her own wages (§ 1367) , though she required her husband's permission in order to be employed.

108 in certain situations, the terms nation and state can be interchangeable:

Where nation and state essentially coincide, their verbal interutilization is inconsequential because the two are indistinguishably merged in popular conception. The state is perceived as the political extension of the nation. (39)

Connor continues to argue that Germany was one of the few actual nation-states, because the "territorial-political structure termed a state" became the "embodiment of a nation-idea" (42). The words state and nation are often used synonymously by people and power structures who wish to focus nation feeling on the state, as the Prussian leaders in Germany sought to do after the forced unification of

German states under Prussia. Reuter's novel tends to use the words Staat and Nation interchangeably, as in the description of the end of the Franco-Prussian war, and the crowning of the Kaiser. The narrative voice, coopting the popular rhetoric, exclaims "dem Traum einer Nation war

Erfiillung errungen" (96) , when what has really happened is the expansion of the Prussian state over what became the

Deutsches Reich.

Of course, neither Germany nor Prussia was a homogenous political or national entity in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. The Reichstag, with representatives elected by universal male suffrage, contained members of six main parties, both conservative and liberal, as well as a

109 few splinter groups/ The German Conservative party represented the interests of the aristocracy and landowners.

The National Liberal party, on the other end of the political spectrum, dominated the Reichstag in 1871, supporting constitutional government and laissez-faire economics. By 1878 the Social Democratic party had claimed twelve seats in the Reichstag (Craig 62-64, 96). Those twelve seats held little sway in the Reichstag, but a growing socialist movement (itself containing factions with varied levels of fanaticism) frightened Bismarck and other government leaders enough to inspire the Socialist Law of

1878. This law forbade membership in socialist organizations, denied the right to assembly to socialist groups and made it easier to deport known socialist agitators (Craig 146). Had there been no perceived threat from the socialists, these measures would not have been necessary. Feminist movements grew at the same time. The

Allgemeiner deutscher Frauenverein (founded 1865) stressed both the importance of employment opportunities for women and demanded the right to involvement in social and political activity for women. The number of treatises and

^ The members of the Reichstag, though chosen through popular election, were by no means representatives of all segments of society. Reichstag members received no salary, which effectively eliminated the possibility of electing officials from the lower or most of the middle classes, who could not afford to serve without pay.

1 10 "scientific" studies arguing that women would be harmed by

such activity, and the specific laws forbidding women from participating in politics indicates the perceived danger in changing women's roles.^ Despite increasing popular support for these political groups, however, the government became increasingly conservative.

This disparity between popular sentiment and the actions of those in power existed not only in the unified

German state, but also in patriarchal households. While it appeared that many people desired the unification of Germany into one state, most individuals had little or no voice in the organization and administration of the state. The appearance of representative government softened the reality of absolute monarchical rule. The emperor had wide-reaching executive power. He could appoint and dismiss ministers

(even the chancellor) , and he had the power to dismiss the

Reichstag, which Bismarck did in the Kaiser's name in 1878.

When Wilhelm I declared in 1882 that, despite parliamentary procedure, he alone was personally responsible for

^ Riehl (1855) argued that women are inadequate at any task outside the family; when women become publicly active in politics and the arts it signals a period of stagnation (55- 56) . Lorenz von Stein's Die Frau auf dem Gebiet der Nationalokonomie was in its sixth edition by 1886. In it, he argued that women are not supposed to seek work in the field of production, thereby "unnaturally" competing with men, but that a woman's role is in consumption, and it is through consuming the goods that men produce that women contribute to the national economy (314-15).

Ill government policy, he demanded nothing that was not already

expressed in the constitution.

The basic purpose of the constitution . . . was to create the institutions for a national state that would be able to compete effectively with the most powerful of its neighbours, without, however, sacrificing, or even limiting, the aristocratic - monarchical order of the pre-national period. (Craig 39)

The patriarchal family at the end of the century, in a

similar way, appeared to be something it was not. Within the middle class, to cite Habermas, the family "seemed to be established voluntarily and by free individuals and to be maintained without coercion" (Structural Transformation 46-

47). In reality bourgeois marriages were usually based on economic need, and the only "free individual" in the family was the father, who ruled over it. In Reuter's novel, the needs of the women in the family are repeatedly sacrificed to benefit the men (brother and father) who represent the state. Reuter clearly indicts the patriarchal family for its victimization of women, and she implies that the German

Reich is also to blame. A system in which strict hierarchy requires simple obedience is ultimately destructive to all members. The men in the family clearly have more power than the women, but they are also victims of larger societal structures.

Gabriele Rahaman sees this connection between the nation-state and the family in Reuter's novel. She points to

112 Klaus Theweleit's concept of "Entlebendigung” (deanimation) to explain how Agathe is used and exploited by her father.

Ernst Heidling, true to his role as a Prussian civil servant, places "loyalty to authority above all else" (461), both in his job and in his family. Rahaman compares Heidling to the Freikorps officers in Theweleit's study. Heidling's life, like the lives of the Freikorps soldiers, is marked by the need to maintain order. In the bureaucracy of the civil service Heidling must follow the orders given to him, but at home he is in charge, and the hierarchy there must be obeyed as well. His desires, wishes and judgement control the lives of the other family members. He understands that his son must go out and seek his own life, but conceives of no such freedom for his daughter. He systematically controls her life, so that she is unable to develop an identity of her own. Theweleit describes the "soldier males" of the

Freikorps as squinting, and seeing an object through slits, thus distorting the object. Onto that object, the soldier can project whatever image he has of the "enemy," and can justly destroy it (Theweleit 216-17). In a similar way

Heidling's squinting gaze removes life from his daughter,

(he never really sees her, never asks what she wants, assumes what he wants for her is the best for her) then projects his own meaning onto her (Rahaman 459). Agathe's personal development is a threat to her father, because he

113 wants and needs her to take care of him. If she develops her artistic yearning and becomes an artist, her attention will be taken away from her father. Even if Agathe accepts a traditional role, marries, and has her own feuaily, it would be a threat to her father. With her own family at the center of her attention, she would not be available to lavish attention on her father or eventually take care of him in his old age.

If Reuter had painted Ernst Heidling as an evil predator with no redeeming qualities, the criticism would stop with him, blaming him for the misery in Agathe's life.

But he is not a monster who consistently victimizes those around him. He is caught in the same culture of hierarchy and subordination as his daughter, even though he holds a higher position in that system and benefits from it more than Agathe does. But he is also only a cog in a larger organization, and his position is subject to the whims of his superiors. Heidling may be responsible for much of

Agathe's unhappiness, but he also cannot be called happy. He lives in constant fear for his job. Both his actual performance in his work and his private life can affect his position, since "state files repeatedly stress 'solid home life' and 'exemplary family life' when documenting civil servants' overall performance" (Kaplan 33). This aspect of

114 Reuter's novel implies that strict social and political hierarchy is damaging to all those involved.

Nationalism is such a vague idea that it has historically taken many forms. The notion that the "natural"

German culture was inherently superior to other cultures played a dominant role in nationalism in the Wilhelmine era.

The military power of the new Germany, its conquests abroad, and the strict military-like hierarchy of the government also played an important role in national identity. The establishment of the German nation-state began the fusion of national loyalty and loyalty to the state.®

Reuter directs her criticism at patriarchal society itself, and unabashedly indicts the patriarchy for its destructive and repressive tendencies toward women. She criticizes both the men who hold that power and the women who support them, while also showing the complication brought by internalizing a destructive system of values.

This challenge to bourgeois standards of behavior is a

® Some of the aspects of fascism described by Theweleit, such as strong desire for order, rigidly defined roles and responsibilities for men, women and all members of society, and a slavish respect for authority, also play a strong part in nineteenth-century German ideas about the nation. Rahaman's study, cited above, posits a link between the kinds of relationships described in Reuter's novel and Theweleit's discussion of what he would consider a fascist mentality. Fascism as a political movement did not yet exist when Reuter wrote Aus outer Familie. but many of the aspects of fascist behavior and thinking Theweleit describes exist in the Germany Reuter portrays in the novel.

115 strong indictment of the patriarchy's manifestations in the

family, the church, and the Prussian government.

AGATHE HEIDLING: BECOMING A GERMAN WOMAN

Agathe is taught to seek happiness and fulfillment by subordinating herself to the male order, as illustrated by a book she receives at her confirmation. Des Weibes Leben und

Wirken als Jungfrau. Gattin und Mutter outlines the roles open to her. As a "Jungfrau" she is expected to obey her father and to prepare for her life as wife and mother. When she becomes a wife and mother, she will be expected to be subordinate to her husband. Her training and education have prepared her for these roles, and she happily anticipates them. Indeed, she wants to seek her happiness in the roles that await her, and wants to believe the things her father, her pastor, and the etiquette books have taught her. She is ready to become the kind of woman the pastor describes at her confirmation, even though she does not quite understand the logic in everything he says.

But Agathe is never allowed past the Jungfrau stage.

Her restriction to this one role emphasizes the constraints on her life. Marrying and establishing a traditional middle- class family would not give her independence, but marriage represents her only opportunity to develop into adulthood and feel as if she has progressed, even though her

116 activities would still be controlled by her husband. In a society that conditions women into believing they must become mothers in order to be fulfilled, denying Agathe a chance to take that role is cruel indeed.

As long as Agathe remains unmarried, her father controls all aspects of her life. He takes her to a church in the country for her confirmation, because he believes that fashion and social status receive too much attention in confirmations in the city. This event is important to him:

"Er schâtzte eine positive Frommigkeit an dem weiblichen

Geschlecht. Für den deutschen Mann die Pflicht, für die deutsche Frau der Glaube und die Treue" (18). The "Glaube" obviously refers to belief in state-sanctioned religion, but it also could imply that a woman must believe in the role that society gives her. A person would need simple faith in the wisdom of the church to accept the contradictory things

Agathe hears on this day. The pastor's speech at dinner following the ceremony is presented to the reader in an internal monologue. Agathe tries to listen and concentrate on his words, but finds it all rather confusing. "Allés ist

Euer!" says the pastor, and Agathe reflects on his words.

"Aber wie soil dieses 'Allés' benutzt werden? Besitzet, als besaSet Ihr nicht — genieBet, als genosset Ihr nicht . . .

! [S]ie begriff durchaus nicht, wie sie es anzustellen habe, um zu geniessen, als genosse sie nicht" (21).

117 Reuter exposes this meaningless rhetoric on the role of

women in a society that openly praises their importance but

requires that they maintain only a quiet and unseen position

through the character of Agathe's mother. Frau Heidling is a

dedicated mother and housewife who accepts this hidden role,

and it destroys her. Already at Agathe's confirmation, Frau

Heidling does not look healthy, and her face is described as

"das verbltihte matte Antlitz, dessen Wangen eine fliegende,

nervose Rote angenommen hatten" (19). She has endured six

pregnancies, and only two of her children reached

adulthood.7 She is expected to run the household frugally while still making her husband's life comfortable. But at

the confirmation, Heidling happily lectures Agathe about her

new responsibilities as a woman, and his speech sounds like

something out of a textbook: "Denn das Weib, die Mutter kiinftiger Geschlechter, die Griinderin der Familie, ist ein wichtiges Glied der Gesellschaft, wenn sie sich ihrer

Stellung als unscheinbarer, verborgener Wurzel recht bewuBt bleibt" (21-22).

While women are expected to remain in the background, the military is ever present in this society, affecting private, familial relationships as well as political ones.

At Agathe's first ball, Reuter uses military terms and

’ The text does not clearly state whether she lost the children through miscarriage, stillbirth, or if they died as young children.

118 describes the men and women as armies on opposite sides of

the ballroom: the women are clad in the light-colored

uniform of ballgowns, the men wear the black uniform of

evening clothes. "Und nun schmetterten die Fanfaren zum

Angriff, und die Schwarzen stürtzten sich auf die Hellen,

allés wirbelte durcheinander und die Schlacht konnte beginnen" (85). One is left with the feeling that the

"Schwarzen" are setting out to conquer the "Hellen." The relationship between the sexes here is openly adversarial, even in a most "civilized" social event like a ball.

Soon after this ball the military appears again. The successful end of the Franco-Prussian war is a time for celebration: "Ein groBer Kampf war in Sieg und Gluck beendet, [und] ein deutscher Kaiser war glorreich gekront .

..." Reuter undermines the glory of the moment, however, by also mentioning the price of this victory. "Tausende von kraftvollen Mannern lagen zerschossen und verwesend unter blutgediingtem Erdreich" (96) . Through ironic use of the romanticized discourse of heroic battle, Reuter distances herself from that discourse, emphasizing that these are neither her words nor her ideas.* "Das Militar zu ehren war

Recht und Pflicht des deutschen Madchens" (96), announces

* Linda Kraus Worley ("Reading Women") discusses how Reuter uses the discourses of various fields from religion to science to the trivial novel "to unmask the limitations of the hegemonic discourses" (431) of the institutions they represent.

119 the narrative voice, clearly adopting the patriotic discourse of the new Germany. At the same time Reuter shows how little substance that honor holds: to show their patriotism and respect for the military, women buy inkwells and vases made from shell debris, and Agathe's friend

Eugenie turns patriotism into a fashion statement.

Eugenie Wutrow hatte immer einen sicheren Instinkt für das Notwendige, für das Ziel, dem die offentliche Meinung ihres kleinen Kreises zustrebt, sie trug einen Paletot, der beinahe ein Uniformrock war, ihr Zimmer glich einer Seitenabteilung des Zeughauses, die zu einem kriegerischen Feste mit Blumen und den Bildern der hohen Feldherren feierlich geschmückt worden war. Der Patriotismus stand ihr wie jede neue Mode und jede ideale Pflicht, womit die ihre anmutige Person herausputzte. (96)

The juxtaposition of the heroic-romantic discourse associated with battle and death against Eugenie's method of honoring the military further trivializes that discourse.

The bloody bodies of thousands of troops do not exist for

Eugenie when she celebrates the victory. Johnson points to the stark "division in sex roles" emphasized in this scene.

"The dead soldiers are forgotten by the men in power while the women, except in their role of honoring the men, are as peripheral in wartime as the inkwells and vases they use"

("Power" 242) . Women are both encouraged and expected to fulfill this peripheral role.

The strict hierarchy of the military order extends into the Heidling family. Adorno found that subjects who

1 2 0 experienced "a relatively harsh and more threatening type of home discipline which was experienced as arbitrary” (385) are more inclined to harbor racist and fascist opinions. In these families relationships seemed to be based on dominance. This generalization about families and authoritarianism also describes the Heidling family. Ernst

Heidling is the strong head of the family, and he is a rather distant ruler. Agathe does not always understand the logic of her parents' rules, and the narrator shows Agathe's confusion by presenting her perspective during events that demonstrate those seemingly arbitrary rules. At Agathe's confirmation party, for example, she receives gifts from many members of the family. Her cousin Martin has sent her a volume of Georg Herwegh's poems. For her, the poems bring memories of a summer vacation with her cousins when she had a crush on Martin, and they read Herwegh together. Lost in her memories as she pages through the poems that paint portraits of romance and nobility in her mind, she does not notice that the room has grown quiet.

Pastor Handler stand auf, ging schweigend um den Tisch herum und nahm ihr den Herwegh aus der Hand. Er trat zu dem Regierungsrat und zeigte ihm hier und da eine Stelle. Beide Herren machten ernste Mienen. Es lag etwas Unangenehmes in der Luft . .

"Mein Liebes Kind," sagte Pastor Handler beschwichtigend zu Agathe, "ich denke, wir heben Dir das Such auf und bitten Vetter Martin gegen ein anderes umzutauschen. Es giebt ja so viele schone Lieder, die für junge Madchen geeigneter sind und Dir besser gefallen werden." (23)

121 The pastor and Heidling do not mention that Herwegh's anti-

Prussian politics and his calls for revolution make his

books a dangerous addition to the library in the household of Prussian civil servant. They simply tell Agathe that the poems are not appropriate for her. She does not know how to react to the apparent contradiction in what she has been taught.

"Allés ist Euer," war ihr eben versichert worden, und gleich darauf nahm man ihr das Geschenk ihres lieben Vetters fort, ohne sie auch nur zu fragen. Widerspruch wagte sie natürlich nicht. Sie hatte ja Gehorsam und demvitige Unterwerfung gelobt für das ganze Leben. (26)

This seemingly arbitrary disregard for her feelings and for the contradictions in the things she has been taught cause great distress for Agathe, but her father and the pastor see only a "liebes Kind," unable to think for herself or make or own decisions.

Indeed, Agathe never is allowed to develop past the stage of "liebes Kind." For Heidling she will remain his little girl, and always will be so, since he effectively eliminates her opportunities for marriage (see below). In his mind, she stays a "junges Madchen" who needs his guidance and protection. Agathe has resigned herself to playing the role of dutiful daughter (housekeeper, that is), and living out her days caring for her parents. While dusting one day, she notices some books in her father's study and reads them. She finds Hackel's Natürliche

122 Schopfunasaeschichte the most fascinating, both for its

content and for the surprising pleasure she finds in the

intellectual challenge.

Sie hatte geglaubt, es ware für Frauen einfach unverstândlich. Zu ihrem grofiten Erstaunen konnte sie dem Verfasser gut folgen — sie brauchte nur aufmerken und am Tage bei ihren Beschâftigungen das Gelesene in ihrem Kopfe sinnend zu bewegen. Wie es sie aufrüttelte von dem geistigen Halbschlaf, dem mifimutigen Hindammern, daB sie sich die Augen rieb, sich auf feste FUBe stellte und wiBbegierig um sich blickte. Einer weiten Weltreise war es in seiner Wirkung zu vergleichen — eine Weltreise mit erhabenen Rückblicken in ungeheure Vergangenheiten und Fernsichten auf eine von Entwickelungskraften erfüllte Zukunft .... (302)

After reading the text, Agathe feels that she finally

understands bits of things she had heard about in offhand

remarks and jokes for years, but that no one had ever

bothered to explain to her. Reading Hackel challenges her

intellect in a way that nothing else ever has, and she wants more, so she asks for three books from the bibliography in her Christmas list. Her father's condescending response angers and shames her: "Was willst Du Dir denn für unverstandliches Zeug in Dein kleines Kopfchen packen?"

(305). The double diminutive of "kleines Kopfchen" emphasizes his view of her as a little girl with no serious

intellect, which she may under no circumstances try to develop. After scolding her for looking at his books without his permission, he starts to keep the book cupboard locked.

123 successfully foiling Agathe's attempt to obtain more education. Heidling finds a more appropriate book on flowers in Germany for his daughter.

"Siehst Du, liebes Kind," sagte ihr Vater freundlich, "hier habe ich ein sehr hiibsches Werk gefunden, das besser fvir dich pa&t, als die Bûcher, die Du aufgeschrieben hast. Ich blëtterte in den Sachen — sie wollten mir gar nicht für mein Tochterchen gefallen. Hier findest Du eine Anweisung, wie man Blumen trocknet — daraus fabriziert Ihr ja jetzt allerliebste Lichtschirme! Das wird Dir Spafi machenl" (307)

Reduced to such useless reading, Agathe begins to understand that she will never be allowed to change: "Sie war 'das junge Madchen' — und mufite es bleiben ..." (307). The text does not specify her age at this point, but she is probably close to thirty. According to the role she must play, however, and to how she is treated by her father, her age and level of maturity remain irrelevant.

Heidling's attitude toward his daughter's education is typical for a middle-class father of the period. Middle class women were expected to be able to manage their households, as well as have enough general education in such subjects as history, music and literature "so that they would be understanding wives and intelligent mothers to their children" (Frevert, Women 17). John Stuart Mill criticized the education and training available to women as preparing them only to be willing slaves to the men in their lives. From early in their lives, women must learn that

124 their future lies in submitting to men (Mill 26-27) . Agathe has learned her task well. She cannot complain, she must do her duty, even if it destroys her. Her mother, who has

internalized the values and morals of patriarchal society, has taught Agathe the same duties. Even though Agathe attempts to fight against this internalization in herself, she cannot overcome her environment. Her mother's example is not a positive one, however, as she eventually annihilates herself to care for her family. She has accepted the role that has been given her, as shown in the scene where Agathe tries to argue with her father about reading scientific books. Frau Heidling has been told all her life that such books are not appropriate for women, and she therefore would not like it. She believes what she has been told, reacting to Agathe's desire to read more of Hackel; '"Das Buch mit den schrecklichen Illustrationen? ' fragte Frau Heidling.

'Aber Agathe, so etwas mochte ich doch nicht lesen'" (306).

Frau Heidling is the perfect mother and housewife, who has no opinions or desires of her own: "Agathe's mother is a pathetic character precisely because she does what she is supposed to do as a mother and wife" (Johnson, "Power" 239) .

Frau Heidling's selflessness eventually leads to her death.

She becomes ill after years of caring for her ailing brother-in-law; on her deathbed, she requires that Agathe promise to look after her father. This responsibility

125 naturally falls to the daughter. Frau Heidling would never

ask her son Walter to take this kind responsibility for the

family. It is understood that he must leave and start his own family, not be hindered by responsibilities to his parents.

Agathe has also internalized the role and responsibilities she has been taught, though not as successfully as her mother, and she does not know what to do about it. She sees how her mother suffers from the work and the strain of her life, and sees that something is wrong but still wishes for the same role herself. Since Agathe never marries, she is never able to put those energies into her own house and family. This contradiction causes Agathe to battle with herself constantly, both wanting to do what she has been taught she should do, and questioning those lessons. Her father knows nothing of this internal conflict.

Taglich nahm er sie in den Arm und küBte sie, des Morgens und des Abends — aber was sie ihr Leben lang empfunden und durchgerungen, davon ahnte er nichts. Wie zart und geiibt, wie gütig und geschickt hâtte die Hand sein mUssen, der es gelungen ware, die dunklen Instinkte, die gahrenden Gewalten, die in verschwiegenem Kampf sie zerwiihlten, bis in die Form des Wortes herauszulockern. (308)

It never occurs to Heidling to ask his daughter how she is feeling and what she is thinking. She has been trained as a dutiful daughter not to question her father's judgement, and

126 she has learned that she cannot trust her father to listen to her deepest concerns.

Agathe repeatedly discovers that she cannot trust the people closest to her. As a young child, for example, her friend Eugenie tells her how babies are made, and Agathe's first response is disbelief. Later, when she receives confirmation from another source, she is appalled. "Aber

Mama hat doch gelogen, als sie ihr erzahlte, ein Engel brâchte die kleinen Babies," (36), she muses. Upset by the shocking information about sexuality, she is ashamed to see

Eugenie again and tries to avoid her. She also does not know how to deal with her mother. Agathe had, of course, been taught to tell the truth, and learning that her mother had willfully lied to her about something as important as babies causes her great distress.’ Agathe's distrust of her mother prompts her to engage in a brief rebellion when Frau

Heidling sends her to take flowers to Eugenie after Eugenie had been ill. Along the way Agathe meets another schoolmate, tosses the flowers aside, and goes for a walk, returning home much later than she is normally allowed. Knowing that she has broken the rules (though in her mind, her mother has

’ A half century later de Beauvoir notes that learning about reproduction is still usually a grave experience for young girls. "The reassurances given by grown-ups leave the child uneasy; as she gets older, she learns not to take the word of adults anymore, and it is often in just these matters concerning reproduction that she finds them lying" (337) .

127 also broken the rules by lying), Agathe's fear increases as

she nears home: "Sie empfand . . . eine groBe Furcht vor

ihrer Mutter, wie vor etwas schrecklich Erhabenen, vor dem

sie nur ein kleines Wiirmchen war” (40-41) . Her fear is not

unfounded. Upon her return her mother must do her duty and

administer punishment with a switch. That Agathe has just

experienced a moral crisis while trying to reconcile how her

mother could have lied to her is irrelevant. Frau Heidling's

determination to teach Agathe to respect authority must take

precedence over any subjective experience she may have had.

Though Frau Heidling holds the responsibility of

teaching her daughter to respect authority, she holds little

authority herself. The mother must enforce the rules, but

for the most part, she does not make them. The scene in

which Frau Heidling must beat Agathe shows both a violent

struggle between mother and daughter and a deep internal

struggle within the mother:

Als die schauerliche Strafe zu Ende war, wankte Frau Heidling erschopft in ihr Schlafzimmer und sank keuchend und weinend auf ihr Bett nieder. Sie wuBte, daB sie sich nicht auf regen sollte, und daB sie furchtbare Nervenschmerzen auszustehen haben wiirde. Bis zuletzt, wahrend der Sorge und Angst um Agathe hatte sie gekampft, ob sie es thun musse. Ja, es war ihre Pflicht. Das Kind durfte sich nicht so iiber alle Autoritat hinwegsetzen. (41-42)

What does this corporal punishment achieve? Frau Heidling will suffer from ”furchtbare[n] Nervenschmerzen” and Agathe will be totally humiliated and cowed. More important for

128 social order, however, the mother will have done her duty.

The pain it causes her remains irrelevant.

The mother is in conflict with her own feelings, thus dissipating her energies in self-destructive guilt, while the father, even in his absence, has asserted his control and consolidated his power without losing his daughter's affection. (Rahaman 463)

Agathe has a more intimate relationship with her mother than with her father, but she likes her mother less, because Frau

Heidling must play the role of enforcer.'®

While Agathe tends to view her father in a more positive light than her mother, this view is unfounded, since he is the one who actually runs her life. Ernst

Heidling understands little of what his daughter wants and needs, and views her more as a possession. When Agathe is twenty years old, she is invited to the home of a distant cousin. Her mother hopes that she might be introduced to

*° De Beauvoir comments on the relationship between daughters and fathers. [The child] realizes that if the father's authority is not that which is most often felt in daily affairs, it is actually supreme; it only takes on more dignity from not being degraded by daily use; and even if it is in fact the mother who rules as mistress of the household, she is commonly clever enough to see to it that the father's wishes come first; in important matters the mother demands, rewards and punishes in the father's name and through his authority. The life of the father has a mysterious prestige; the hours he spends at home, the room where he works, the objects he has around him, his pursuits, his hobbies, have a sacred character. He supports the family, and he is the responsible head of the family. (323)

129 some appropriate men and might find a husband there.

Agathe's father, on the other hand, strongly opposes the trip. "Er sah nicht ein, wozu er eine Tochter habe, wenn sie auf Reisen gehen wolle” (116). Heidling needs Agathe at home, because she brings life into his otherwise unhappy

"Beamtendasein” (Rahaman 464). To continue his bleak existence and fulfill his duties as a civil servant, he must project his hopes of happiness onto his daughter.

Heidling — and all the good, loving Prussian fathers — meike sure that their daughters' lives are so "entkonkretisiert," so bereft of possibilities for autonomous action, that there is plenty of free-floating energy left for their own use. (Rahaman 465)

The extent of Heidling's control of his daughter is made clear when Agathe wishes to marry. Having given up any notions of romantic love, she settles on the Landrat

Raikendorf, an unattractive, forty-year-old man whom she does not even like. (He insulted her at her first ball when she was seventeen.) Agathe rationalizes that he is at least respectable and has a good position. Agathe is twenty-four years old, and she knows she will have few more opportunities to marry. Her father, however, does not seem to approve. The specific choice of husband seems to disturb him less than the actual prospect of Agathe marrying and leaving home. Frau Heidling recognizes this reluctance, telling Agathe, "Du kannst nicht von ihm verlangen, daB er

Dich gern hergiebt" (263-4). The notion of her father giving

130 her away further emphasizes the feeling that Agathe is

property. Behind closed doors, Raikendorf and Heidling

discuss the terms of the exchange of that property. When

Raikendorf learns that Agathe has no dowry, even though she had told him her mother had a small inheritance that she could have, he abruptly leaves, without a dowry, he will not marry her. Only after this incident does Heidling even tell his wife that he has used the money that had been earmarked as Agathe's dowry to pay the gambling debts incurred by her brother.

This kills two birds with one stone: it keeps the father's reputation as an honourable citizen, which was threatened by his son's debts, and at the same time Agathe is forced to stay with her "Papa" as his companion - and after her mother's death - as a housekeeper, a kind of wife substitute. (Rahaman 464)

Heidling was not legally required to pay his son's gambling debts, but he obviously felt socially obligated to do so. It is necessary for him to save face for himself and to help

Walter enter into a financially advantageous marriage. The discovery of a secret debt would have been legal grounds for

Walter's fiancee to break their engagement. The son marries, establishes his own home, and will provide grandchildren.

Agathe, on the other hand, who had been taught that her role in life would be fulfilled as "die Mutter künftiger

Geschlechter, die Griinderin der Familie" (21) , will have no such home of her own. By disposing of her dowry, Heidling

131 ensures that she will never be given the chance to fulfill

the only role for which she has been prepared.

This episode points to a striking ambiguity in the laws

governing property in marriage and in the laws concerning a

father's responsibilities. The Büraerliches Gesetzbuch

clearly states that a woman's inheritance stands under the

control of the husband. Technically, it remains her

property, but if he is given the power to invest, manage and

spend it as he sees fit, then for all practical purposes, it

is his money. He is not required to consult with her before

handling it, but he is required to inform her of the status

of her inheritance if she asks about it (Bürger 1 iches

Gesetzbuch § 1374). Frau Heidling is the perfect submissive

wife, who seldom asks her husband about financial deals. In

a similar vein Heidling is not legally required to provide

his daughter with a monetary dowry, but he is required to

give her "zur Einrichtung des Haushalts eine angemessene

Aussteuer” (§ 1620) , within his financial means. Agathe

needs the money for this Aussteuer, or trousseau, since

Raikendorf's salary is insufficient to support two people

and set up a household. Again, there is a loophole. If her

father does not approve of the marriage, he can decline to provide a trousseau.

This episode concerning Agathe's dowry also suggests the connection between the distribution of power in the

132 family and in the state. Laws protecting the rights and needs of all individuals of the family exist, but the father is given total control over how those laws are implemented, and he also has the power to ignore them. Similarly, the

Kaiser is subject to laws that should curb his power, but he has the option of ignoring them. The distribution of power in the public world mirrors that of the private world.

PUBLIC AND PRIVATE LIVES

Heidling's position as Regierungsrat, however, renders a division between public and private moot. Because of his position, the private lives of both him and his family must stand up to public scrutiny. His concern with public opinion affects how his daughter can behave, even in ostensibly private situations. Searching for some meaning to her life and trying to connect with other people, Agathe is tired of the church services in the Staatskirche, which she attends with her parents on alternate Sundays. There she sees people who attend only for appearances and either doze off during the sermon or simply pay no attention. She finds a group of

Jesubriidern, whom she believes are more sincere, and attends their services. When her father learns from a colleague that the leader of the sect has socialist leanings, he forbids her to continue attending. "Der Oberprasident hat mir offen gesagt, man sieht es ungern, daB die Tochter eines hohen

133 Regierungsbeamten die Versanmlungen eines solchen Mannes

besucht" (232), he explains to her. Agathe^s "private"

religious activities could harm her father's "public"

career.

In light of the laws concerning civil servants, however, it becomes clearer why a man in Heidling's position would be so quick to forbid his daughter to attend the

services of this religious sect. Bismarck blamed the two attempts on the Kaiser's life in 1878 on the socialists, though only weak evidence tied the assassins to the socialist party. Later that year, he was able to bully the

Reichstag into passing the Socialist Law. In an attempt to immunize the Prussian bureaucracy from socialist and liberal influence, civil servants were closely watched. Anyone who displayed liberal tendencies could be denied promotion or even dismissed (Craig 157-8). This forced homogeneity receives an ironic jab from Reuter as she describes Heidling and a few of his colleagues at a ball. They stand together and chat, but Reuter makes it seem rather boring. They do not argue or debate, "weil man im Grunde als preuBischer

Beamter nur eine Meinung haben konnte und allerseits treu zu

Kaiser und Reich stand" (85). The consequences for being linked to a socialist movement help explain Heidling's adamant opposition to Agathe's associating with her cousin

Martin. To Agathe Martin is a lovable relative who

134 stimulates her intellect in a way that no one else in her

family does. To her father Martin's presence is a threat to his career because of his ties to socialism.

The imagined line between public and private is crossed again when, because of unspecified political maneuvers,

Heidling loses his position with the state:

Irgendein Minister hatte Differenzen mit einem anderen Minister, oder er vertrat ein Gesetz . . . und Papa . . . bekeun seinen Abschied. Wie das zusammenhing, horte Agathe natürlich nicht. Sie hatte es doch nicht verstanden, und es wâre dem Regierungsrat überhaupt nicht eingefalien, ein junges Madchen in Berufsangelegenheiten einzuweihen. (294-295)

In this section Reuter subtly shifts the narrative from

Agathe's perspective to Heidling's perspective, demonstrating how little they know about each other. And it is clear that a gap exists between them because of the barriers erected by Heidling, not Agathe. In spite of her father's attempts to keep Agathe out of his Berufsleben, these events have a direct effect on her life. The family must live on his limited pension, so they get a smaller apartment, which they can afford only by subletting a room to Heidling's brother Gustav. Of the household staff they retain only one maid and the old cook. Heidling's wish to maintain his former lifestyle, however, forces his wife and daughter to work harder so that he will not be disturbed by their near poverty. Meyer argues that this kind of attempt to maintain the expected standard of living was not

135 uncommon: "Sparen meinte im bürgerlichen Haushalt die

Reduktion der zum Leben der Familie erforderlichen

Geldausgebungen durch die Vermehrung der von Frauen

geleisteten Arbeit — Ausbeutung statt Geldausgeben" (69) .

The additional family member adds work, and the reduction in help means that fewer people exist to do the work, but this additional work for the women does not appear significant to

Heidling. It does, however make a big difference in Agathe's

life:

Agathe hatte jetzt tiichtig zu thun, um den Hausstand reinlich und in geregelten Gange zu erhalten. Auf die alte Dorte [die Kochin] war auch kein rechtes Verlassen mehr. Agathe war nicht an wirkliche Arbeit gewohnt, und sie litt viel an den krankhaften Zustânden, die sie sogar ihrer Mutter verheimlichte. Denn dann würde vielleicht Papa davon gehort haben, und das ware Agathe unerhort peinlich gewesen. (296)

Agathe has internalized the notion that women should be a

"verborgene Wurzel" in the family. She does not bring attention to herself, she tries to fulfill her duties quietly without complaint, no matter how difficult or senseless they seem. In an attempt to prolong the life of the living room carpet, for example, Agathe sweeps it and rolls it up every night, according to her mother's wishes.

While Agathe and her mother scrimp and work to keep the household going, "Papa wurde sehr bose, sobald der geringste

Angriff auf seinen Komfort und auf den vornehmen Anstrich der Haushaltung gemacht wurde" (298). Heidling fails to

136 notice what it costs his wife and daughter in both mental

and physical health to maintain the standard of his household.

After Frau Heidling's death, Agathe must manage the household entirely on her own, and still with little help.

The death of Frau Heidling is hard on both Agathe and her father, but in different ways.

Der Regierungsrat Heidling hôrte von alien Seiten, daB seine Tochter sich durchaus eine Erholung gonnen miisse. Er selbst hatte nichts dergleichen bemerkt, sie war ja nicht krank und that ihre Pflicht. Aber da der Hausarzt es auch meinte, so sollte natürlich etwas geschehen. Ihm würde ein wenig Zerstreuung auch wohlthatig sein. Er vermiBte seine arme Frau mit jedem Tage mehr. Agathe gab sich ja alle Mühe — aber die Frau konnte ihm so ein junges Madchen doch nicht ersetzen. Seine Gewohnheiten waren trostlos gestort. (321, emphasis added)

For Heidling, the most difficult aspect of his wife's death seems to be how his habits have been disturbed since she is not there. His habits have been disturbed because in many ways, his wife played a maternal role for him, nurturing him and seeing to his needs as a mother would do for a small child. While her mother's death causes emotional pain for

Agathe, she is not given the opportunity to mourn but must continue to work, even as the added responsibility in the household drives her to physical and emotional exhaustion.

This section clearly illustrates Heidling's relationships with the women in his family: he depends on their services to keep his life running smoothly. As long as Agathe plays

137 the appropriate role and does her duty, he assumes that everything is fine.

Just as Heidling believed his Berufsangelegenheiten had no relevance to Agathe's life, however, so the household management is beyond his scope of vision. This indifference to housework does not seem surprising, considering the

Victorian notion that housework is not work, but an act of love. At the same time, housewives took pains to hide the actual work they did (Meyer 45) . Frau Heidling and Agathe work behind the scenes, when Heidling is not around, so he does not see them. The reader, however, sees what work is going on and who is doing what. Reuter makes is clear that other women work secretly, too. The confirmation dinner at the beginning of the novel is held at the pastor's home, and the pastor's wife, "ungesehen von den Gasten," (26) is busy at work in the kitchen with the maid. They may be only a poor country pastor's family, but the notion that a bourgeois wife should not have to do physical work reigns here, as well.

CLASS DIFFERENCES

Though Reuter emphasizes the plight of bourgeois women, she does not entirely ignore the position of lower-class women, especially those employed as servants. The Heidling's cook Dorte, for example, receives a party and gifts after

138 serving the family for twenty-five years. The entire family gathers to celebrate the event, and Reuter laces the description of the celebration with an ironic tone. Heidling praises Dorte for her ”Pf lichterftillung, " while Agathe and her mother think about how well it reflects on them.

*'[W]enigen Herrschaften konnte man heutzutage nachsagen, daB ein Dienstbote so lange bei ihnen ausgehalten habe” (273) .

Moreover, at this celebration where Dorte wears a new dress, receives "das silberne Kreuz, das die Kaiserin zu diesem

Zwecke gestiftet habe” (273) , and is given many other gifts from the family, Dorte has baked the cake herself. On this special occasion, the cook eats dinner in the dining room with the family, but she is uncomfortable:

Eine fremdartige Gestalt in dem Kreise der vornehmen Bürgerfamilie, der sie ein Viertelj ahrhundert gedient hatte — ihr die Nahrung bereitend — in Winterskalte und Sommersglut am Herde, wenn sie noch schliefen, und mit dem Geschirr klappernd, wenn sie schon die Ruhe suchten — eine Tag wie alle Tage — fünfundzwanzig Jahre lang. (275-276)

The narrative voice adds a rhetorical question: "War es ihr nun eine hohe Ehre, daB sie einmal — nur einmal an dem

Tische sitzen durfte, für den sie so lange gesorgt hatte?"

(276). Dorte has given the Heidlings many years of her life, while they have paid her a pittance and taken her for granted. It seems that no one in the Heidling family, other than Agathe, sees anything negative in this event. At the end of the day Agathe finds Dorte, who has changed back into

139 her regular work clothing, in the kitchen washing the

dishes.

Agathe h&tte ihr gern etwas gesagt von Hochachtung Oder Bewunderung. Aber es wollte ihr nichts über die Lippen. Eine Ahnung, als habe man das verschrumpfte alte Geschôpf mit diesem Amtsschreiben, der Bibel, dem Ehrenkreuz auf irgendeineweise, die ihr doch nicht klar war, um des Daseins besten Teil betrogen, hinderte sie zu reden, wie sie es gewünscht hâtte. (277)

If this brief praise is all that Dorte has to show for her work in the Heidling household, it belittles the years she has given them.

The irony in this event is more striking when, in the middle of the description of the celebration, the narrator mentions a person who is not there, the maid Luise. "Mitten

im Vierteljahr hatte man sie fortschicken . . . miissen. Und das Madchen machte anfangs einen so netten Eindruck" (275).

The information that the young girl was dismissed without great ceremony seems to cancel out any praise the family should receive for having had the loyalty of the cook for all these years. It also reintroduces a character who has been missing since early in the novel, reminding the reader of her existence. While raising the question of why Luise was fired, it prepares the reader for an important episode coming up in the novel.

Soon after the celebration for the cook's years of service. Luise contacts Agathe. Luise was fired because she was pregnant, and Frau Heidling refuses to tolerate such

140 immorality in the house. She comments on neighbors who,

rather than dismiss an excellent cook, ignore their cook's

affairs. "So ein Frauenzimmer um sich zu haben — ein

greulicher Gedankei" (281). What Frau Heidling does not

know, however, is that her son Walter has also been sexually

involved with Luise." Agathe knows, because Luise came to

her for help after Walter took the key to her room. While

the word rape is never used, it seems clear that Walter

forced himself on this girl. Agathe does not know what to

think, and her confused reaction betrays her own fears and

stereotypes about sex. At first, she does not want to

believe it: her brother is a handsome, noble young officer,

and he is already engaged to be married. She cannot imagine

how he would want to be with the lowly maid Luise in her

tiny, dirty, dingy room. Luise, however, is so distraught

that Agathe eventually believes her, and decides to handle

the situation herself in order to protect her parents from the shame and protect Walter from their anger. "Wenn sie das

ihrem Vater sagte, es muBte eine furchtbare Szene werden — etwas so Ehrloses würde Papa seinem Sohne nie und nie verzeihen" (111). She is partly correct — there would be a scene if she told her father, less from his anger over his

" Little information is given on the father of Luise's child, though it seems certain that it is not Walter. Nonetheless it is obvious that it could have easily been Walter, and Luise probably would not have been treated differently.

141 son's immoral behavior than because his pure daughter Agathe

beceune involved in it. Agathe does not know that

. . . the typical master of the Wilhelmine bourgeois household thought that a kind of right to sexual access went along with hiring a servant girl. He would often encourage his sons to have their first sexual experiences with the servant girls, when the boys were still too young to visit brothels. (Theweleit 166-167)

While there is no evidence that Heidling encouraged his son

to rape/seduce the maid, it seems reasonably certain that a

man in his position would not have been particularly

appalled by such an event. Agathe, raised with a strict

moral code, is most surprised to learn that her brother does

not seem to be held to the same code. Walter's reaction when

she confronts him astonishes her. Rather than showing any

shame, he is angry with her, shouting, "Ich verbiete Dir,

Dich in meine Angelegenheiten zu mischen — horst Du? Du

betragst Dich nicht wie eine Dame, sondern wie ein

exaltiertes Frauenzimmer. Es ist unpassend von Dir, an

solche Dinge zu riihren! Verstehst Du mich?" (114) .

Unfortunately, Agathe herself has the same notion that this

sexual encounter is somehow dirty, and it affects her

attitude toward Luise more than toward her brother. She thinks Luise has somehow been tainted by this incident. "Es war fiir sie etwas Gemeines an dem Madchen geblieben” (115) .

Agathe's feelings toward her brother, however, do not seem to change.

142 The fact that Reuter does not give the information on

whether or not Frau Heidling knows about her son's

activities implies that his sexual activities are not

important. Either she does not know, or she chooses to

ignore it. Whatever he has done, he is still in a

respectable position and will settle down in a respectable marriage. It is also implied that Raikendorf (whom Agathe had wished to marry) has had numerous "Verhaltnisse” with women, and yet he still was a suitable candidate for a respectable marriage. The division of women into categories of good and bad is clear in the views of the Heidling family. Sexually active women are criticized and ostracized, while the sexual activities of the men are ignored.

After being thrown out of the Heidling household, however. Luise has few options. Luise contacts Agathe for help. Her child has died, and she has no money to bury it.

Agathe helps her, but Luise is also ill and soon dies. When confronted with Luise's tragic end, Agathe begins to question the inflexible code of morality by which she lives.

Ware Mama damais nicht so emport gewesen und hatte Wiesing [Luise] nicht so schonungslos fortgejagt — und sie selbst hatte sich auch voll Abscheu von ihr abgewandt, — hatte man sich um sie gekiimmert in ihrer schweren Stunde und dafür gesorgt, daô das Kind zu ordentlichen Leuten gethan ware, und vielleicht den Lohn des Madchens erhoht, damit sie ein gutes Kostgeld fiir das Wiirmchen zahlen konnte .... Aber das ware unmoralisch gewesen, und darum durfte das nicht geschehen . . . . (291)

143 Slowly, Agathe sees the contradictions in a code that

defines morality as abandoning a destitute woman and her

child.

Moreover, Agathe realizes that she and Luise are not

all that different from each other. Reuter emphasizes some parallels in their lives, beginning with their confirmations. Luise is confirmed at the same time, in the same church as Agathe, and as children they played together.

Agathe wonders what would have happened if some things in her life had been different. She had fallen in love with the painter Lutz, and though she barely knew him, he was a central part of her fantasy life for many years. She thinks about what happened to Luise:

Freilich — furchtbar leichtsinnig muBte ein Madchen schon sein, um sich so weit zu vergessen. — Und wenn Lutz gewollt hatte .... ? 0 mein Gott, warum wurde das Unrecht, die fvirchterliche Schande plotzlich ein gutes Recht, nachdem der Herr Pastor ein paar Worte ausgesprochen? Das war ein schauerliches Geheimnis. (291)

Realizing that she may not be so different from Luise,

Agathe concludes, "sie und ihre Mutter waren schuldig" for

Luise's sad demise, because they let an inflexible moral code keep them from helping this poor creature. The seemingly arbitrary rule of morality that labels Luise's behavior as immoral and relegates her to the fringes of society finally causes her death. Agathe cannot see the

144 morality in banishing Luise from "respectable" society for something that many "respectable" people do as well.

Agathe continually tries to reconcile these contradictions she sees, but cannot. She also cannot simply ignore the morals and social codes she has been taught, even though she knows they are basically flawed and that most people only outwardly live by them. Her sister-in-law

Eugenie, for example, has everything that Agathe has been conditioned to desire: a perfect marriage, a beautiful son, and a rich home. But Agathe is disgusted by Eugenie's behavior. Eugenie manages to be happy because she keeps the appearance of the good daughter, wife and mother that is expected of her. At the same time, however, she has affairs with other men, and she is petty, cruel and seemingly incapable of love.

CONCLUSION

Unable to rebel against the system that allows such behavior, Agathe finally fights against the patriarchy in the only way that seems possible to her: she physically attacks her sister-in-law. Agathe hates Eugenie because she feels that Eugenie has been dishonest all of her life, and has still managed to attain happiness. Agathe, who has tried to follow the rules her family and society have set up for her, is only frustrated and overworked. Eugenie accompanies

145 Agathe on a visit to a spa, where Agathe is to recover from overwork, but pays more attention to the young doctor than to Agathe. Disgusted, Agathe watches how Eugenie once again flaunts the rules of morality and gets away with it. Agathe has been unable to assert herself at any other time in her life. At this moment everything she has suppressed— her desires for love, freedom and independence— comes out as she tries to strangle Eugenie.

This attack may be misdirected, but Eugenie serves as an indirect representative of the patriarchy, since Eugenie seems to have been able to make the system work for her.

Eugenie is also the only representative of the patriarchy who is vulnerable to Agathe. Of course, no one understands why she would attack Eugenie. "Ein junges Madchen hatte den

Verstand verloren — es war nichts gar so Seltenes [und] . .

. man wuBte keinen Grund — absolut keinenl" (377-8). After two years in a sanatorium, receiving shock treatment, hypnosis and baths intended to cure her "illness," Agathe, reduced to a brainless old maid, returns home to her father.

Rather than Agathe taking care of her aging father, as would be expected, her father must care for her as best he can, unaware that he and what he represents have caused her troubles.

Ironically, Agathe's crippled mental state at the end of Aus outer Familie renders her closer to the expectations

146 of the "good” bourgeois woman than she has ever been: she no longer opposes her father, and she is "happy" to be occupied with crocheting and listening to the occasional story read from the newspaper. Unfortunately, for society to bring her to this agreeable state, she also had to lose her mind, and she is no longer useful. The other women in Reuter's novel also either adapt or get destroyed. Agathe's mother dies of exhaustion after taking care of the men in her life, and

Luise dies of malnutrition and illness. Eugenie has managed to maneuver a path between her wishes and what society expects from her, but she is not a very pleasant person, and there is no way to know whether or not she is truly happy.

Reuter holds all of German society responsible for the troubles brought upon these women. Before her final breakdown, Agathe is sent to a spa to recover from being overworked. The spa is full of women, and they have all come for the same reasons:

Frauen — Frauen — nichts als Frauen. Zu Hunderten stromten sie aus alien Teilen des Vater landes hier bei den Stahlquellen zusammen, als sei die Fülle von Blut und Eisen, mit der das Deutsche Reich zu machtvoller GroBe geschmiedet, aus seiner Tochter Adern und Gebeinen gesogen, und sie konnten sich von dem Verlust nicht erholen. Fast a lie waren . . . jung, auf der Sommerhohe des Lebens. Und sie teilten sich in zwei ungefahr gleiche Teile: die von den Anforderungen des Gatten, von den Pflichten der Geselligkeit und den Geburten der Kinder erschopften Ehefrauen, und die bleichen, vom Nichtsthun, von Sehnsucht und Enttauschung verzehrten Madchen.

147 Manner besuchten den Ort nur selten. Ein hysterischer Kiinstler war jetzt anwesend, ein Oberst a. 0., der seine Frau nie allein reisen lieB, und der Arzt. (369-370)

Marriage, children, and interaction with society are

supposed to make women happy, but these things have somehow

backfired and ruined them. By suggesting that the Deutsches

Reich benefits from the suffering of these women, Reuter

spreads the blame among all segments of society. State, nation, bourgeois society and individuals are all part of a

system that exploits those with little power.

More importantly, however, Reuter shows the fluidity of the roles of victim and victimizer. While her central character receives most of the attention in the novel and

Reuter clearly emphasizes the suffering of this daughter of a good family, she also shows how others suffer for different reasons. Agathe's realization that she and her mother personally played a role in the death of their former maid Luise illustrates the multiplicity of their positions.

Luise was not left destitute and dying by some nameless, faceless system. Rather, she died because individual people like Agathe and her mother blindly accepted and enforced the rules and morals of that system. Similarly, Ernst Heidling is both victim and victimizer. It is for his comfort that

Frau Heidling and Agathe work and sacrifice their health, and they all believe they are behaving properly. At the same time, Heidling is vulnerable in his job to the political

148 whins of his superiors, and that is how he finally loses his position.

Individuals shift in these roles of victim and victimizer because of the hierarchical structure of

Wilhelmine society. Freytag praised that structure as the backbone of a German nation-state, which he saw as beginning in the family. In Soil und Haben. however, Freytag did not imagine the results of abusing that system, and also did not consider how it affects individual growth. Reuter depicts that structure as damaging to all individuals involved and criticizes both the structure of the hierarchical nation­ state and individuals who support and perpetuate it.

149 CHAPTER 5

OF MAIDS AND MOTHERS: BO%ENA

INTRODUCTION

I have argued that in the novels Soli und Haben and Aus outer Familie a correlation exists between hierarchical family relationships and the organization of national government. Both of these novels describe circumstances in which government is based on the model of a hierarchical, patriarchal family. The nationalism portrayed in these novels shows a chauvinistic notion of national superiority and manifests itself by exerting power over other nationalities. This chauvinistic nationalism, which enjoyed a strong following in Germany at the end of the nineteenth century, is but one form of nationalism.*

If a strongly patriarchal family can be linked to strict government hierarchy and chauvinistic nationalism, can the opposite be assumed? Would a different notion of family lead to different understandings of state and nation?

* This kind of nationalism is at the fore of Freytag's novel, and in the background of Reuter's.

150 The novel BoSena (1876) by the Austrian Marie von Ebner-

Eschenbach, seems to imply just that. The matriarchal feutiily, headed by Bogena, defies both class and national hierarchies. The family formed at the end of the novel, with the marriage of the once-destitute, bourgeois Roschen and the aristocrat Ronald, signifies a joining of traditions and a rejection of marriage and family as places to exercise power.

BoSena's dual role of maid and mother is somewhat problematic. The plebeian maid becomes the mother of the future based on her character and morality, rather than birth privilege or riches. The kind of power BoBena wields is able only to influence others. Her integrity wins the respect of people who hold traditional power (money and birth privilege), and she needs those people in order to achieve her goals. Ebner-Eschenbach explores a kind of power and influence that results from neither brute force nor economic superiority. With that in mind, it makes sense for her protagonist to be a person who has access to neither of those traditional means to power. While the novel seeks this alternative power, however, it also reinforces the ideology of separate spheres. Bogena's morality is based on her selfless devotion to her children: she is a good mother and accomplishes her goals primarily because she sacrifices herself and chooses to have no life of her own. She does

151 have the power to influence her employers, and her child's future depends on it. Her power, however, is limited by the long process of winning her employers' trust and respect.

Without their cooperation BoSena can do little to help

Roschen. Ebner-Eschenbach reevaluates the kind of strength and morality exhibited by BoSena, but still limits her power to the "private" sphere.%

Carl Steiner comments that the "novel's historical background is the Revolution of 1848, which brings death, destruction, and social change in its wake" (151). I argue that the Revolution provides more than background; it is central to the conflict in BoSena. The Czech struggle for national recognition has many parallels in the novel. Though it makes no blatant political statements, the title character, who embodies goodness, fairness and honesty, is

Czech. The manifesto of the Slavic Congress, as discussed below, claimed these characteristics to be specifically

Slavic. Boïena's adversaries, who are manipulative, hypocritical and domineering, are German. Bo2ena is the strong matriarch of a family built on love, trust and devotion, and she seeks only what rightfully belongs to her

^ BoBena's role as selfless mother is similar to the role of Frau Heidling in Reuter's novel. Devotion to her family and children bring little to Frau Heidling. Ebner-Eschenbach hopes for a world in which many more people are like BoSena, and the world itself rewards those individuals. In the world Reuter paints, self-sacrificing mothers are only subjected to more exploitation than others in society.

152 children. BoBena's quest to recover Roschen's lost

inheritance can be read as a parallel to Czech attempts to

gain recognition for their nation. BoBena does not seek

revenge for the wrongs committed against herself and

Roschen, nor does she seek to control Nannette and Régula

for personal gain. She fights only to regain what rightfully

belongs to Roschen, just as the Czechs sought to maintain

their rights as a nation against increasing attempts at

"Germanization" within the Austrian Empire.

AUSTRIA AND NATIONALISM

The Austrian Empire in the nineteenth century, unlike

Germany, was a long-standing multi-national state, in which

no one nationality ever held the majority. Each national

group had well-established cultures and traditions, but no

political autonomy. Tensions existed among competing nationalities, but, with the exception of the German

Austrians, and to a certain extent, the Magyars,^ the tension centered not on asserting one nationality over the other, but on establishing each nationality in its own right.

In the Habsburg lands, traditional historic nationalism worked with a marked difference. Promoted by conservative forces, it was not much concerned with adjusting the borders of the empire

3 For more discussion on Magyar nationalism, see chapter 5.

153 in conformity with the dreams the various nationality groups had of past national glories. But it was very seriously concerned with upholding, regaining, and adjusting the rights, privileges and the social structures of the "historical entities," "kingdoms" or "lands," which, in the course of time, had joined the association of the Habsburg lands. (Kann 34)

This upholding of the rights of individual nationalities

seems to imply a negotiation between equals, rather than the

imposition of an allegedly superior nationality on others.

Nineteenth-century Austrians used the term "historisch

politische IndividualitMt" ("historicopolitical entity") to

refer to the lands and nationalities of the empire that had

at one time been independent (Kann, Multinational 34) .

Within the empire, these historicopolitical entities kept

their own cultures and traditions. No national group was in

the majority; therefore most nationalist movements desired

independence or at least some autonomy within the empire.

These national movements were conservative, attempting to restore and maintain traditional rights (for example, self administration and official use of national languages) against the new constraints of the Austro-Hungarian Empire,

in which the German minority sought to gain control and

forcibly "Germanize" the empire through the imposition of

German language and culture, as when the emperor Joseph II

(1780-90), declared German the official state and administrative language of the empire. Of all the different ethnic and national groups in the empires, Austro-Germans

154 sought not only recognition as a historicopolitical entity, but domination of the empire, "based on the alleged superiority of their historic cultural and social tradition"

(Kann, Multinational 46).

The Czech nationalist leader Frantiâek Palackÿ (1798-

1876), did not seek to overthrow or dissolve the Austrian

Empire, but to reform it. He envisioned a federation of

German and Slav states that respected minority rights. The struggle between Germans and Slavs, he argued, formed the central issue in Czech history. "The ideological form of this conflict had been expressed in the struggle of Slavic principles of democracy, equality, and liberty with the principle of German feudalism, based on the distinction between the lord and his subject" (Kutnar 10). Even though

Palackÿ elevated "Slavic principles" over German feudalism, he sought only the legitimization of the Slavic nation, not the subjugation of the Germans. In a letter to the German

National Assembly in Frankfurt in 1848, Palackÿ wrote;

The rights of nations are in truth the rights of Nature. No nation on earth has the right to demand that its neighbours should sacrifice themselves for its benefit, no nation is under an obligation to deny or sacrifice itself for the good of its neighbour. Nature knows neither dominant nor underyoked nations. ("Letter" 306)

In this letter, Palackÿ declined an invitation to join the new parliament and bring Bohemia into the new German

155 Federation/ Palackÿ maintained that Slavic interests could

best be served by continued association with the Austrian

Empire, if the empire became a federation of states. Palackÿ

believed the world was moving toward increased

centralization, requiring the smaller nations to seek

protection in mutually beneficial federations. International

relations, he argued, "should be based on the idea of the

natural right of nations to exist" (Kutnar 11).

Later in 1848 the First Slavonic Congress issued its

manifesto to the nations of Europe. This manifesto, drafted

by Palackÿ, again demanded national independence. The

manifesto contrasted the militarism of Germanic states

against the desire expressed by Slavic nations for simple

independence and peace. It criticized "Latin and Germanic

nations" which had "ensured independence for their own

States by the might of the sword," and based their

statecraft "mainly . . . on the right of superior force"

("Manifesto" 309).

On the other hand, the Slavs, among whom liberty was ever cherished the more fervently as they showed little aspiration for conquest and dominion, and among whom the desire for independence always prevented the formation of a higher central power of any kind, fell in the course of the ages, people after people, under alien dominion. ("Manifesto" 309)

* "The assumption was that, as of old, Bohemia was part of Germany" (G. Mann 98).

156 Not only do Slavs desire liberty and independence for nations, continues the manifesto, but for individuals as well.

The Slav . . . remains true to his natural character and the principles of his forefathers. He demands neither conquest nor dominion, but he asks for liberty for himself and for all others; he demands that liberty shall be unconditionally recognised as the most sacred right that man possesses. Therefore we Slavs reject and hold in abhorrence all dominion based on main force and evasion of the law; we reject all privileges and prerogatives as well as all political differentiation of classes; we demand unconditional equality before the law, an equal measure of rights and duties for all. ("Manifesto" 310)

The rhetoric of this manifesto sounds egalitarian and democratic. The manifesto, however, is a political document, replete with political rhetoric, and perhaps overstatements.

As such, the manifesto cannot be taken at face value as an expression of the national views of all Slavs, as it claims.

Nonetheless, it expresses the ideal views of some prominent

Czech leaders. As an expression of those ideals, it represents a challenge to the traditional organization of

Austrian society at national, social and individual levels.

Despite its democratic sound, Palackÿ's rhetoric is not without problems. His argument for Czech cultural autonomy, based on "natural" rights, is no stronger than the arguments of German idealists who promoted German domination through similar notions of "natural" rights. Palackÿ argued that

Slavs have a natural moral superiority over Germans; German

157 idealists argued that German culture was "naturally"

superior to Slav culture.

While Palackÿ's vision for the Czech nation and the

Austrian empire did not represent the national goals for all

members of the Austrian empire, many of Palackÿ's ideas were

accepted by other reformers. The idea that smaller nations

had a right to exist within the larger empire played a

central role in the plans of Albert Schâffle. While he at

first distrusted the liberal-national movements, he

eventually caved to the demands of Bohemian nationalists in

order to promote his own idea of "organic federalism." He

proposed that all social and ethnic groups should swear

loyalty to the Austrian state. That state would be "a social monarchy, in which universal suffrage and broad reforms would guarantee the allegiance of every subject" (Gentry

313). Municipal governments could operate in the native

language of their locality, and all nationalities would be prohibited from imposing their culture and language on other peoples. The Austro-Germans rejected this final provision, and the Bohemian Germans opposed the idea that Czech would be the official language in Bohemia, but Schaffle continued to argue his point. "Until his death in 1903, he maintained that Austria's nationality problems and unbridled nationalist sentiments would have surely diminished had his programme of organic federalism been adopted in 1871"

158 (Gentry 317) . Instead, 1871 saw the foundation of the dual monarchy, which extended the privileged status enjoyed by

German Austrians to include Magyars in the empire, but did nothing to improve the position of other nationalities, including the Czechs.

MARIE VON EBNER-ESCHENBACH, A MULTICULTURAL WRITER

In this milieu of arguments about the role of various nationalities within the Austrian Empire, Marie von Ebner-

Eschenbach began to write prose. Born in Moravia, she learned to speak Czech from her Czech nursemaids, and only later mastered the German language. She thus grew up in a multi-ethnic setting. The idea that people of diverse ethnic nationalities could and should be able to work together within a larger empire or federation played a large role in the nationalist goals of many Austrians. Palackÿ's manifesto challenges two power relationships central to the organization of society: the subordination of Slavic cultures to German and Latin cultures and the subordination of the lower classes for the benefit of the nobility in an out-dated class system. It does not, however, deal with a third power relationship that is also central to the organization of society, the distribution of power according to gender. Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach explores all three of these power relationships in her first novel Bogena.

159 Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach's prolific writings seemed

to reach their peak in critical attention around the turn of

the century. In 1900 at the celebration of her seventieth birthday, she was the first woman to be awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Vienna. By this time, writes Gabriele Reuter:

Ihr Neune, die Daten ihres Lebens, eingehende Besprechungen ihrer Novellen, ihrer Gedichte und Aphorismen, ihrer Lebensanschauung, ihrer Ethik, ihrer Religion wurden durch die Presse in die fernsten Gauen, in alie verborgensten und literaturfremdesten Ecken und Winckel gctragen, da man noch in deutscher Zunge redet. (Ebner 7)

Numerous studies of Ebner-Eschenbach's life and work were published in the first three decades of the twentieth century, but only with the development of feminist criticism has her work received more attention in the academy. BoSena. her first long prose text, however, has continued to receive little attention. Helga Harriman mentions Bo2ena with a list of other female characters who express a quiet feminism in

Ebner-Eschenbach's texts. "Without uttering feminist rhetoric in strident tones, these figures are emancipated in the deepest meaning of the word" (Harriman 31). Carl Steiner calls the novel "highly innovative," in its spanning three generations of one family. He identifies BoSena as a

Fajnilienroman that pre-dates Thomas Mann's trend-setting

Familienroman Buddenbrooks by a quarter of a century (151).

Despite the novel's innovation in genre, and the challenges

160 it presents to the patriarchal organization of the bourgeoisie, however, Edith Toegel's 1991 study on fathers and daughters in Ebner-Eschenbach's texts fails to mention the abusive power relationship in BoSena.

B02e NA: a CZECH MATRIARCH

Heidi Beutin, one of the few critics to focus on

Bo2ena. cites three issues as evidence that BoZena should be viewed as an example of the literary avant-garde within bourgeois realism. The novel challenges bourgeois standards in issues of nation, class and gender: the title figure is

Czech, lower class, and female (247). But the central theme of the novel, according to Beutin, is the conflict between patriarchy and matriarchy:

BoZena steht fiir das Matriarchat. Man konnte . . . erwagen, ob Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach nicht ihre Erzahlung als Gegenwurf zu Grillparzers Libussa konzipierte, vorsatzlich oder unbewufit. Denn haben wir in Grillparzers Libussa ein Trauerspiel vor uns, das den Untergang des Matriarchats zum Thema hat und das Heraufkommen des Patriarchats, so ware es moglich, entsprechend als Thematik der Erzahlung BoZena zu benennen: die Wiedergeburt des Matriarchats aus der Mitte der Geringen, aus dem Plebejertum. (254)

Grillparzer's Libussa.^ was not the only nineteenth-century text to focus on the idea of ancient matriarchal societies.

^ Though not published until 1872, parts of Libussa were performed already in 1840. Since Ebner-Eschenbach knew Grillparzer personally, it seems reasonable to assume that she was aware of his work on the play before it was published.

161 Bachofen's Mutterrecht (1861) was widely read and debated, and Bachofen himself corresponded with Lewis Henry Morgan, author of The League of the Iroouois (1851). Morgan's research on the Iroquois revealed that in pre-colonial

America women "held a relatively high status in Iroquois society" (Leacock, "Women" 28). In his Ancient Society

(1877) Morgan praised Bachofen's work (Boas lii). Friedrich

Engels, in turn, based his understanding of ancient matriarchal societies on Morgan's work and outlined it in

Origin of the Family. Private Property and the State (1884).

While these texts explore the idea of matriarchy through mythical, sociological and historical perspectives, Ebner-

Eschenbach imagines the establishment of matriarchal society in the world she knows. Contemporary issues such as class and national struggles play central roles in the founding of her vision of matriarchy.

A plot summary will aid the discussion of this text.

The title character of the novel is a maid, employed in the

HeiBenstein household in Moravia. BoBena is Czech; her employers are German. After the deaths of his son and his first wife, Leopold HeiBenstein marries Nannette, a woman many years his junior, in hopes that she will bear a son who will carry on the family name and continue to run the family business. He already has a daughter, Rosa, from his first marriage. Rosa is headstrong and independent, and her

162 elopement with the army officer Fehse enrages her father.

HeiBenstein cuts his disobedient daughter out of his will and decrees that he has but one daughter. Régula, from his second marriage. Bo2ena follows Rosa and her husband, and she stays with them until their untimely deaths. BoBena then returns to the HeiBenstein household with Rosa's young daughter Roschen, begs forgiveness for running away, and hopes for a place in the family for HeiBenstein's granddaughter. By now, HeiBenstein is old and dying, and he rues his anger at his older daughter. He tells Nannette and

Régula that they must right the wrongs committed against his granddaughter, but dies before he can officially alter his last will and testament. Nannette and Régula do not follow his wishes. More concerned about their social reputations than for the welfare of the young orphan, they provide for her education and physical needs and let her live with them, but they do not divide the inheritance with her. The rest of the novel focuses on BoSena's quest to reinstate Roschen with her rightful inheritance. She finally succeeds when

Régula buys the estate of the financially bankrupt Graf von

Rondsperg. After Roschen and the earl's son fall in love,

BoSena convinces Régula to give the estate to Roschen as a wedding present.

163 THE MORALITY QUESTION

Despite BoSena's role as a servant in the HeiBenstein

household, she is the moral head of the family, and her

honesty is respected by both her peers and her superiors.

Her morality is stained by only one event, one night with a

lover. Critics commenting on BoZena have often focused on

the results of this night and on the question of BoZena's

alleged guilt.

Da ist gleich zuerst BoZena, die robuste Magd aus dem Volke, deren durch aufopfernde Hingabe ihres ganzen Lebens gesiihnte Schuld darin besteht, dass sie in einer einzigen Nacht iiber dem eigenen Glück die Serge um das Kind ihrer Herrschaft vergessen hat. (Reuter, Ebner 70)

In that one night that BoZena spends with her lover

Bernhard, Rosa runs away from home. Rosa must go through

BoZena's room to leave, and therefore BoZena's absence allows her to go. Critics argue that this guilt motivates

BoZena's quest to have Roschen's inheritance reinstated.

"Sie weiB — und gerade diesem Gedanken hat die Dichterin

immer wieder Ausdruck verliehen — , daB Reue nicht geniigt, um ein Vergehen zu sühnen" (GroB 278). This argument suggests that since BoZena's alleged sin is responsible for

Roschen's losing the inheritance, she must atone for that sin by getting it back. Heidi Beutin, however, suggests that

BoZena carries no guilt. She made a mistake one night, and there is no way to know if she could have stopped Rosa from leaving with Fehse, or if she would have even tried to stop

164 them (Beutin 250). Since Bo2ena later defies her employer to help Roschen marry the man she loves, it may be safe to assume she would have encouraged Rosa to pursue her love despite HeiBenstein's wishes.

The critics' preoccupation on the subject of Bo2ena's guilt reveals a contradiction in attitudes toward maternal sexuality. As the mother figure, Bo2ena must deny her sexuality; her maternal feelings must take precedence over any other desire. Indeed, she makes a conscious decision to have no love other than to her children. When she bids

Bernhard goodbye, she tells him to keep the gifts she has given him, explaining, "ich werde keinen Liebsten mehr haben, dem ich es schenken kônnt" (77, sic). Furthermore, she tells him, "ich habe gefrevelt gegen meine Natur," (79), implying that her life is only for the service of her children, and she must avoid anything that keeps her from caring for them.

Bachofen viewed the mother-child bond as the origin of morality and matriarchy, and mother-cult as a defense against the frenzied sensuality of the Dionysian cult. "Es kann nicht verkannt werden: die Gynakokratie hat sich iiberall in bewuBtem und fortgesetzem Widerstand der Frau gegen den sie erniedrigenden Hetarismus hervorgebildet, befestigt, erhalten" (xix). His explanation of the origins of maternal society supports the notion that female

165 sexuality stands in opposition to maternity and morality.

This view of maternity is, of course, problematic, since women must engage in sexual activity in order to become mothers.* Sexual activity for reproduction was seen as moral and a woman's duty in the nineteenth century, while sex for pleasure was viewed as immoral. Bo2ena is in a double bind, since she is also a member of the lower class. While pre- and extra-marital sexual activity were forbidden for middle- class women, it was often assumed that lower class women did engage in such activity (Frevert, Women 133). As the nineteenth century progressed, the middle classes increasingly emphasized morality and respectability as a way to identify themselves as separate from the lower classes

(Mosse, Nationalism and Sexualitv 5). Bo2ena's sexual activity, as the only stain on her morality, therefore appears more pivotal than it is. To establish BoBena as a moral figure in the plot, then, her one "sin" requires dramatic atonement.

On the other hand, the novel also questions the notion of morality itself. Despite her blatantly "immoral" act,

Bo2ena is the most moral character in the novel. The sin and guilt in this novel do not center on BoBena's one-time

* It is, of course, possible to become a mother through adoption. BoBena could be said to be Roschen's adoptive mother, even though no legal documents regulate their relationship.

166 lapse, but on HeiSenstein's hard-hearted response to his daughter Rosa and Nannette and Regulars continual rejection of Roschen's rights as a family member. BoBena's quest to right the wrongs committed against Roschen is therefore not an attempt to atone for her own sins, but to aid the helpless young Rôschen, who has become a daughter to her.

BoSena's brief love affair, after all, does not cause the problems in the HeiBenstein family. The question of guilt should be directed at the other main characters in the novel, since they are all guilty of something. HeiBenstein is guilty of coldness to his first wife and harsh insensitivity to his daughter's needs. He disowns Rosa and then remains inflexible in spite of her attempts to contact him. He eventually softens, but it is too late. On his deathbed, HeiBenstein wonders if it would have been easier to forgive Rosa if she had written to him soon after she left. The reader knows Rosa did write to him and that

Nannette burned the letter. This act directs some of the blame at Nannette, since HeiBenstein's receipt of the letter might have led to a reconciliation. Moreover, Nannette saw

Rosa on the night she left and could have kept her from going. The description of what Nannette sees and thinks makes it clear that she knows that she should stop Rosa, but she chooses to let her go.

. . . Jetzt, jetzt sieht sie in die Lichtscheibe, die eine der Dampen auf den Boden

167 wirft, eine Gestalt treten — eine Gestalt im weifien Reitermantel — sie scheint eine zweite zu stiitzen, zu leiten... Einen Augenblick sind die Beiden klar und deutlich sichtbar, dann verschwinden sie im Dunkel. Nannette hat sie erkannt... Und ihr Gewissen ruft ihr zu: Verhindere Unheil — rette das Haus vor Schmach. Auf! auf! Den Mann geweckt — ein Wort, ein Ruf von ihm fiihrt das verirrte Kind zuriick. Noch ist es Zeit — tu deine Pflicht! Was Pflicht! ... Ihrer Tochter den Weg bereiten, das ist ihre Pflicht!... (67)

Nannette returns to bed and tells no one what she saw. The next day, she feigns surprise when others notice that Rosa is missing.

Nannette continues actively to hinder a reconciliation.

Her husband asks her to place advertisements seeking information on Rosa's whereabouts, but Nannette delays in following his wishes. She fails to summon the lawyer when

HeiBenstein requests his presence (presumably to alter his will). When HeiBenstein agrees with his estate manager

Mansuet that he was wrong in disowning Rosa and that they should care for Rosa's daughter, exclaiming, "An der wollen wir allés gutmachen!" (110), Nannette opposes the idea. "Ich sehe nicht ein, warum das Kind dafiir belohnt werden soil, daB seine Mutter — davongelaufen ist," she tells Mansuet.

When he reminds her of her responsibility toward the child,

Nannette refuses to accept any. "'Vor allem will ich meine

Schuldigkeit tun gegen meine Tochter,' erklarte Nannette.

'Elternpflicht ist die erste Pflicht'" (112). Bo2ena believes the same thing, but does not let her parental

168 responsibilities hurt anyone else. Nannette believes her

responsibility toward her biological offspring justifies any

action she might teüce to help her daughter.

Both Nannette and Régula seem to take offense to

HeiBenstein's interest in little Rôschen. Nannette continues

to deny any responsibility toward Roschen, despite the

emotional scene at her husband's deathbed:

Ein Schatten glitt fiber sein Gesicht: "Die Verwaistel..." hauchte er, und eine schwere Trane rollte ihm die Wange entlang. Plôtzlich raffte er sich auf; ein Funke der alten Kraft wurde lebendig in ihm, er erhob das Haupt und wandte es gegen Régula . . . Seine Hand, die so lange bewegungslos gewesen, deutete auf das Kind. "Deine heiligste Pflicht!" rief er gebieterisch seiner bleichen Tochter zu . . . "Verstehst du mich? ..." Damit sank er zuriick. Einmal noch hob sich seine Brust — und er hatte ausgelitten. (118)

At this time. Régula is still a young girl, so her mother

should take the responsibility for carrying out

HeiBenstein's last wishes. While Nannette actively stands in

the way of a reconciliation between HeiBenstein and Rosa,

then tries to keep him from reinstating Roschen, Régula is

guilty only of passivity.

Though neither Régula nor Roschen was involved in the actual events that led to Rosa's disinheritance, the final confrontation comes between them. Régula, though she benefits from Rôschen's disinheritance, did not cause it.

She is not personally responsible for something her parents did when she was only a young child. Still, since she finds

169 herself in an unjust situation, it is Régula who has the

responsibility in the end to rectify that situation.

PATRIARCH VS. MATRIARCH

BoBena/s relationships with Rosa and Roschen provide a stark contrast to the relationships within the HeiBenstein family. Leopold HeiBenstein is the domineering head of the family, and the first two paragraphs of the novel reveal most of the pertinent information about him:

Leopold HeiBenstein war der reichste und einer der geachtetsten Bürger des mahrischen Landstadtchens Weinberg. Ob auch einer der beliebtesten, das stand dahin und machte die geringste seiner Sorgen aus. Witzbolde unter den Eingeborenen meinten, ein Mann von Geist und Geschmack sei er jedenfalls, das brings schon sein Geschaft mit sich — das ansehnliche Weingeschaft namlich, das sich seit Generationen in seiner Familie forterbte, und das er zu unerhorter Blüte gebracht hatte. Wie Leopold der einzige Sohn seines Vaters gewesen war, so wurde auch ihm nur ein mannlicher Sprosse, aber ein prachtiger Junge beschert, der den Ruhm des alten Hauses glorreich fortzusetzen versprach. (5)

The reader is immediately told HeiBenstein's full name, his occupation, and that the HeiBenstein family has successfully run this wine business for many years. He is an astute businessman and has been able to improve the winery. He wants both business and name to continue with his son. The reader receives no information on the father's personal feelings for his son, only that the son will fulfill the role his father has prepared for him. The son's name is not

170 important, it is important only that he is the son of

HeiBenstein and will carry on the family name. It seems that the family is important to HeiBenstein primarily in terms of what it can do for the business. HeiBenstein himself is not

Moravian. Even though the family has lived in Moravia for generations, he is still considered an outsider. And it is clear that he has not gone out of his way to maUce contact with people. He is respected for his business skills, but not particularly well-liked.

The emphasis on HeiBenstein's name accompanies his emphasis on his possessions. His most important possession is the wine business, which has retained the HeiBenstein name for many generations. After his son's death,

HeiBenstein hopes to pass the family name through his daughter by convincing Lieutenant von Fehse, Rosa's suitor, to change his name when the two marry. His discussion with

Fehse is reported in the novel in indirect speech.

Ihm hatte der Himmel seinen Sohn genommen, aber seine ehrenwerte Firma musse doch fortbestehen, und so sei es denn sein unabânderlicher Entschluô, die Hand seiner alteren Tochter nur demjenigen Manne zu gewahren, der sich herbeilieBe, den Namen HeiBenstein anzunehmen und dereinst das Handlungshaus weiterzufiihren. (56)

On one hand, insisting that his daughter keep her maiden name and pass it on to her children presents a challenge to the patriarchal order. When a woman marries, she leaves her father's control and becomes the property of her husband.

171 Keeping her own name can signify some independence from her

husband. In this situation, however, HeiBenstein is not

concerned with his daughter's individual identity and power,

but with the ownership of his property. He wants to ensure

that his property will continue in his name.

This emphasis on property shows an ambiguity in

attitudes toward marriage. HeiBenstein's speech to Fehse

makes it clear that his business and his family name mean

more to him than the happiness of his daughter. While

popular literature reveals that the issue of love-marriage

received much attention at this time, most bourgeois

marriages continued to be arranged according to financial

rather factors rather than personal affection (Frevert,

Women 107) HeiBenstein knows that Rosa and Fehse are in

love, yet he still makes this demand. The use of indirect

speech in reporting what HeiBenstein says to the young

lieutenant provides some distance to his words. It gives the

impression that this is a rehearsed speech, and makes it

sound slightly ridiculous. It also adds a touch of irony, as

if Fehse were reporting his words to some one else after

their conversation. Fehse is a proud young man with his own

^ The issue of love-marriage provides the central conflict in many novels in the middle and the latter half of the nineteenth century, including Fanny Lewald's Jenny (1843) , Theodor Fontane's Effi Briest (1895), and Ebner-Eschenbach's Unsiihnbar (1890) .

172 heritage, and he is not going to change his name for anyone.

When he refuses, HeiBenstein throws him out.

The title character however, is referred to only by her

first name. She appears several pages into the novel, and

the description of her is markedly different from the

description of HeiBenstein.

[HeiBenstein] überlieB die fernere Erziehung . . . [seiner Tochter] der Magd des Hauses, einer derben und verlâBlichen Person von zweiundzwanzig Jahren, mit Namen Bo2ena. Für diese SuBerte das Kind schon zu Lebzeiten seiner Mutter eine z&rtliche Liebe, welche die arme Verstorbene oft eifersiichtig gemacht hatte. Rosa nannte die Dienerin, wie sie es wohl von andern gehort hatte, "die schone Bo2ena" und ertrug die raue Behandlung, die sie zeitwise von ihr erfuhr, mit frohlicher Standhaftigkeit. (8)

The important information in this passage tells the reader about the relationship between Rosa and BoSena. Little information about Bogena's past is ever given; what she does is more relevant to her identity than who her parents were.

BoBena is repeatedly referred to with a descriptor before her name, and these are names she has earned: "die schone

Bo2ena," (8) "die groBe Bo2ena" (119), and "die gute Bo2ena"

(273). These names tell both about her physical appearance and her character. A family name gives no such information.

Indeed, the reader does not learn Bogena's last name until much later in the novel, when Bo%ena leaves the HeiBenstein house and her full name, "Bo2ena Ducha," is written on her suitcase. Last names imply ownership: they tell the identity

173 of a person's father or husband, and in the case of a woman

in the nineteenth century, a father or husband "owns" her.

BoSena's last name becomes relevant only in relation to her

possessions, and since she has few possessions, she does not

need the name much. In her suitcase Bogena has all of her

possessions, and they are labelled accordingly.

The first description of Bogena tells much about her

physical appearance and her interaction with others;

Die schone BoBena hatte sich an GroBe und Starke kühnlich mit einem Flügelmanne des Garderegiments Friedrich Wilhelms I. messen konnen. Dabei besaB sie ein ausdrucksvolles und gescheites Gesicht, in dem ein Paar rabenschwarze Augen funkelten, die auch der mutigste Mann nicht ohne leises Grauen in Ungnaden auf sich gerichtet sah. Das schonste jedoch an der schonen BoSena war die Rote ihrer Wangen und das blendende WeiB ihrer Zahne .... Gegen allés Schmucke und Zierliche empfand BoSena Verachtung, aber mit der Reinlichkeit nahm sie es genau; die Arbeit flog unter ihren Handen, und so blitzblankes Hausgerat, einen so nett gedeckten Tisch, so sauber gehaltene Stuben wie im Hause HeiBenstein fand man auf Meilen in der Runde nicht wieder. (8-9)

This description tells the reader both about BoBena's physical appearance and her character. She is pretty, but not in mid-nineteenth-century bourgeois terms of passivity and delicacy. BoBena is intelligent, large and strong.

Female beauty in Western Europe has long been linked with fragility and petiteness— one has only to think of the legendary beauty of Cinderella, whose tiny feet receive so much attention. With small feet, it is unlikely that

Cinderella is tall or robust. Her ugly step-sisters, on the

174 other hand, have feet that are too large for Cinderella's

shoes. Larger feet imply that they themselves are tall and

perhaps even fat. At a time when most middle-class women

"sought to preserve a nacreous, pearly-white fleshtone,

proof that they did not go out much and loved the indoors”

(Knibiehler 327} , Bo2ena is strong, healthy and active, with

Amazonian characteristics.

Bogena's strength and activity are necessary for her work. The narrator gives Bo%ena credit for the work she performs in the house. This aspect of the description is

especially striking when compared to the household descriptions in Freytag's Soil und Haben. Whenever the narrator comments on the physical condition of a middle- class house, it is the lady of the house who receives the credit for its care (or the criticism for its lack of care) , even though it is obvious that servants perform the bulk of the work. Freytag's lady of the house, Sabine Schroter, may care for the household linens, but in a wealthy family, it is unlikely that she would engage in dirty and heavy household work. That BoSena, the maid, takes pride in her work, and (at least from the narrator) receives recognition for that work, already questions bourgeois understandings of household management. Bogena is certain, and the reader is inclined to believe her, that the HeiBenstein household would fall apart without her. To a certain extent, it is not

175 surprising that she, a maid, is praised for her hard work.

In contrast to middle-class women, women of the lower

classes were expected to work hard. Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl

praised the work performed by maids, claiming "Magd ist

Ehrentitel" (163).

CLASS STRUGGLES

Being both mother and servant reinforces the notion

that women exist only to serve and support their families.

At times, however, BoSena seems to transcend her role as

servant, and her character exudes a sense of nobility as

well. The narrator assigns attributes to the character of

Bo2ena that raise her above her station of plebeian maid.

Early in the novel HeiBenstein finds Nannette and Bo2ena

fighting, and the narrator compares them to the "Koniginnen

vor dem Dome zu Worms" (18) . This comparison of BoSena and

Nannette to the mythical characters of Brunhild and

Kriemhild elevates BoBena's character in two ways. First, it puts Nannette and BoSena, employer and maid, on even terms with each other; they fight like equals. Second, it compares them both to royalty. The narrator has already shown

Nannette's interest in the nobility, and how, possessed with

"dem Teufel der Hofmeisterei" (15), she irritates her husband. In some ways HeiBenstein and Nannette, (especially

Nannette, even though bourgeois) represent the petty and

176 socially conscious nobility. The narrator hints at this

representation, referring to Nannette as "Frau HeiBenstein

II" (15) , a form of referring to individuals usually used

with royalty. Likening a lowly maid to royalty ignores class

boundaries, comparing the Czech BoSena with a royal

character out of Germanic myth crosses national boundaries

as well.

Bo2ena is repeatedly described in regal terms. One

Sunday afternoon when she goes out dressed in her best

clothes, she emanates nobility again: "Sie war schon und majestâtisch in dieser Pracht, die mSchtige Gestalt" (31).

Even the old Graf von Rondsperg sees her qualities. "Er

erklarte sie für eine der gescheitesten Personen, die ihm

jemals vorgekommen seien" (195), and he refers to her as a

"FürStin Libussa" (196). And this from a man who is offended when the farmers who used to be his serfs fail to stand up and remove their hats when he walks by. Even Régula cannot combat Bo2ena's strength of character. While arguing with

Régula, convincing her to give the Rondsperg estate to

Roschen, BoSena's strength shines: "Die Magd stand da, umflossen von einer wunderbaren, stillen, stolzen Majestat; ihre groBe Gestalt schien noch zu wachsen, ihr ganzes Wesen atmete Macht, und wie Erz klang ihre Stimme ..." (261). As much as Bo2ena has regal characteristics, however, she is still plebeian. This contradiction challenges traditional

177 class distinctions that disregard individual character while

recognizing only economic lineage.

Rôschen challenges some traditions as well. Her

grandfather, Leopold HeiBenstein, wanted his descendants to

carry his name. Roschen does bear her grandfather's name,

but not in the way he had intended. Her full name is

Leopoldina Rosa Fehse, joining the names of her grandfather

Leopold, her mother Rosa, and her father Fehse. While naming

a son after his father is quite common, naming a daughter

after her mother is not. Carrying her mother's name, Roschen

(or "Little Rosa") is part of a new lineage. Roschen

embodies a new tradition and becomes part of a new kind of

family.

THE FAMILY

One definition of family, that of the traditional

"Haus," describes it as a group of people living and working together, and includes servants or individuals who are not blood relatives (Weber-KeHermann 16) . Using this definition, BoSena belongs to the HeiBenstein family and plays a specific economic role, though not necessarily an emotional one. Modern connotations of the word "family," however, imply emotional attachment and love. These modern connotations began to achieve prominence in the late eighteenth century, when people began expecting "an

178 atmosphere of warmth and intimacy” from families (Gottlieb

261) . The HeiBenstein family presents an intersection of

these two forms of family. A close, emotional relationship

exists between mother and daughter, but HeiBenstein, in contrast, never seemed to have any use for a daughter.

Ein Tôchterchen, das seine Frau ihm in den spâteren Jahren der Ehe gebar, betrachtete HeiBenstein als ziemlich unwi1Ikommene Zugabe zu seinem Glücke: "Denn,” pflegte er zu sagen, ”der Sohn trâgt Geld in das Haus, die Tochter tragt Geld aus dem Haus.” (5)

HeiBenstein finds the close relationship between Rosa and her mother embarrassing and inappropriate and does not understand their feelings. He appears, in fact, to have no feelings for his children. When his son dies, his pain seems to stem less from emotional loss than from how the son's death foils his plans for the family business.

"Für wen habe ich gearbeitet? — Ich habe keinen Erbenl" — In dieser Klage gipfelte sein Schmerz. Seine Hoffnungen waren zerstort, seine Erinnerungen vergallt. Wer blickt gern auf ein Leben voll Mühen zurück, wenn ihm die Früchte derselben geraubt worden sind? HeiBenstein konnte, was sein FleiB erworben, nicht einem Namenstrager hinterlassen, demnach war Lohn seines FleiBes dahin. (7)

Less than a year after the death of his first wife, he tells

BoSena that he will remarry, and his reasons are simple;

"Meine Tochter braucht eine Mutter und ich brauche einen

Sohn” (11). For HeiBenstein, family and children are for ensuring the inheritance of property, not for emotional attachment. HeiSenstein's concept of family is closer to the

179 seventeenth-century notion of the pater familias in which family relationships were regulated by notions of duty rather than affection.

This older form of family provides a stark contrast to the kind of family Bo2ena creates with her children. This family is based on maternal love and duty. The educational reformer Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827) saw maternity as a social and moral role, less as a biological role (Allen 25) . Bo2ena, the maid, provides these aspects of maternity for HeiBenstein's daughter. While HeiBenstein is

Rosa's biological father and she bears his name, he does not provide the kind of loving atmosphere she needs from a family. Bo%ena, on the other hand, feels both a responsibility and affection for young Rosa. This feeling of responsibility becomes obvious after a violent argument between BoBena and Nannette. BoSena refuses to apologize, is about to leave the house in anger and never return, thinking

"ich gehe, und das Behagen, die ordnung, die Wohlfahrt des

Hauses nehm ich mit!" (19), when she is stopped.

Sie hatte schon die Schwelle betreten, schon die Klinke erfafit, als sie sich plôtzlich am Kleide ergriffen und zurückgehalten fühlte. Ohne sich umzusehen, versuchte sie von sich zu schieben, was sie hinderte in ihrer triumphierenden Flucht. Da berührten ihre Finger seidenweiche Locken, da lag ihre Hand auf dem Haupt eines Kindes. (19)

The scene in which a child hangs to a woman's skirts, seeking closeness and protection, evokes a strong maternal

180 image. Rosa begs the maid to stay, and Bo2ena finally gives in, accepting the humiliation of having to apologize and beg for forgiveness. This sacrifice of her pride shows how much she cares for Rosa. After Rosa runs away from home to elope with the lieutenant, Bo2ena gives up the security of her position with the Heifiensteins to follow her. For several years she lives with them in financial uncertainty, even uses her own meager savings to support them, and helps care for them and their child, whom she then raises after both parents die. These are the acts of a selfless mother, devoting her life to the care of her children, not a maid hired to do a job.

Bogena also fulfills the morality role as described by

Pestalozzi. Bogena's morality receives special attention, making her more fitting for the role of mother than Rosa's stepmother Nannette. Bogena's honesty is well known, and she is even honest when it can hurt her. She demonstrates this honesty when her old lover Bernhard appears and tells a room full of people about their earlier relationship. Régula muses that Bo%ena could have easily denied it, and everyone would have believed her. Instead, BoSena accepts the shame of her indiscretion. Ironically, it is this one immoral act that provides her with the moral power to overcome Régula later. Her honesty in this incident is a weapon she uses to convince Régula to give the Rondsperg estate to Roschen as a

181 wedding gift. BoSena threatens to tell everyone that Régula had dishonorably come to her inheritance; that Nannette had burned the letter from Rosa asking for forgiveness, which might have healed the rift between Rosa and her father.

Physical evidence of this letter no longer exists, and

Bo2ena is the only living person who knows about it, but

BoBena tells Régula, "Beweisen kann ich es nicht, aber ich werde es sagen und — mir wird man glauben!" (261).

Remembering how Bo2ena told the truth despite her shame years ago. Régula realizes BoZena is right.

Mit schrecklicher Wucht fielen diese Worte auf die Seele Régulas. "Ja, der wird man glauben!" Deutlich und lebendig in jedem Zug erhob sich vor ihr ein langst vergessenes Bild. Sie sah ihre Magd . . . und horte sie sprechen: "Es ist wahr!. . ." BoBena hatte damais nicht zu lügen, sie hatte nur zu schweigen brauchen und [Bernhard] ware als Verleumder gebrandmarkt gewesen; an ihr — hatte keiner gezweifelt. Aber sie sprach, sie gab der Wahrheit die Ehre. Ja, der wird man glauben! (261- 262)

Regulars observation that BoBena would not have had to lie, but only conceal the truth to save her reputation, suggests that, in the same situation. Régula would have chosen to conceal the truth. In fact. Régula had learned from her mother that "Schein ist allés" (131). Her own reputation is built on half-truths and innuendo rather than on the solid truth of BoBena's reputation.

182 But her reputation is very important to Régula, as it was to her mother before her.* Her concern with appearances

becomes obvious at the death of her mother; Nannette has been ill, and she is weak and dying. Régula debates whether or not to go to her, and be by her side, and then falls asleep. Bo%ena calls Régula and wakes her after Nannette is already dead, but Régula still wants to appear like the dutiful daughter.

Weder der Arzt noch der Priester wollen es Wort haben, daB sie im entscheidenden Homente nicht auf ihrem Posten gewesen, und widersprachen denen nicht, die zu erzâhlen wuflten, Nannette sei nach herzzerreifienden Abschied in den Armen ihrer Tochter gestorben. (133-134)

Regulars concern with appearances does have some positive results, since it causes her to continue to provide Roschen with a home, and eventually an inheritance, even though she has no feelings for the daughter of her half-sister.

While BoSena displays strong maternal characteristics.

Régula remains cold and reserved around Roschen.

Aufgebiirdet, aufgedrungen wurde ihr das Kind der Schwester, und der Ruf von Tugend und GroBmut, den sie genieBt, zwingt sie, es bei sich zu behalten. Und in tiefinnerster Seele ist sie ihm so unbeschreiblich abgeneigt! Allés an ihm miBfallt ihr, stort sie, regt sie an, seine Liebkosen bringen sie in Verlegenheit. (148)

* Of course, the appearance of respectability and morality was the core of a middle-class woman's social status. Since Nannette and Régula have no careers outside the home in which they can gain status, they must use the only career available to them: that of virtuous mother and daughter.

183 Mansuet Weberlein, the "Konunis," calls Régula "das unmütterlichste Frauenzimmer, das ihm jemals vorgekommen sei" (148). Everyone else who comes in contact with Rôschen

(including Mansuet) finds her to be a lovable and charming child. Only Régula, like her mother before her, cannot forgive the "sins" of Roschen's mother, and the shame brought on the family by her disobedience. At the same time, however, they benefit from Rosa's disinheritance, since it means they do not have to share the estate with her. Still,

Régula's sense of duty and public position require that she continue to look after Roschen.

After the incident in which Bo%ena publicly admits that she had a lover. Régula is concerned with how it will look for her to continue to keep Bogena in her employ;

Eine Person, die ihre eigene Schande in der Wirtsstube ausruft, ist keine passende Umgebung für eine ehrsame junge Dame. Andrerseits ist es auch nicht leicht, Bogena zu entlassen, "weil sie der Familie durch so lange Jahre treu gedient hat," sagt, "weil sie mir sehr nützlich ist," denkt Régula. (158)

Régula needs Bogena to run the house and care for Roschen, even though she is concerned that keeping Bogena after her admission to such an "immoral" act would look bad. It is because of Régula's concern with appearances, however, that

Bogena is able to make her employer provide Roschen with a home, and honor her responsibilities to the young girl.

Bogena's position as dependable family maid has provided her

184 with the information and the leverage she needs to reinstate

Roschen's inheritance.

CONCLUSION

The way the two mothers in the novel, Nannette and

Bogena, care for their children can be compared to two forms of nationalism. Nannette sees her responsibility only to her biological offspring, and seeks to better her daughter's position, no matter what the cost to others. Nannette's understanding of parental responsibility is similar to the kind of chauvinistic nationalism that seeks to dominate other nations. Bogena, on the other hand, tries only to regain what has been taken from her adopted daughter and restore her rights within the family.

The role of Régula also shares some similarities with the nationality problem in Austria. Régula benefits from an unjust decision made in the past— the decision to cut Rosa out of HeiBenstein's will. Régula played no part in this decision, but after her parents die, she is the one left with the power and responsibility to change it. This problem of responsibility is also relevant to the question of national rights. Those people holding power within the

Austro-Hungarian Empire in Ebner-Eschenbach's lifetime were not personally responsible for the actions that led to the subordination of other nationalities to the German and

185 Magyar powers. Those in power, however, continued to benefit

from an unfair system, therefore they have some responsibility to change it. Not because they were responsible for its origin, but because they were responsible for its perpetuation.

Bogena is Czech and plebeian, and she embodies the values and the character of the ideal Slav. Her role as mother to Rosa and Roschen deemphasizes the importance of biological ties in families. If she can be viewed as

Rôschen's mother, then Roschen's marriage into a noble family forms a union between Czech plebes and the German nobility. Perhaps this should be viewed as a new class in society in which Rôschen and Ronald represent a new order.

Ronald retains his title, but that title is meaningless without hard work to improve the estate. And he is not able to maintain the estate without Roschen's help. In a similar way, Austrians of all nationalities must work together for the economic and social improvement of the empire. Rôschen

"inherits" the Rondsperg estate, not because of the power of her father, but through the strength of her mother. The power invested in the Czech maid/mother Bogena challenges both traditional patriarchal family structure and the notion of the superiority of German nationals in the Austrian

Empire.

186 CHAPTER 6

UNCONVENTIONAL FAMILIES, UNCONVENTIONAL NATIONS:

BRIGITTA AND THE CONCEPT OF HOME

INTRODUCTION

Adalbert Stifter's novella Briaitta (1844) portrays an unconventional family. The title character is a divorced mother who runs an estate in a remote region of Hungary' and maintains a strong friendship with her former husband,

Stephan. By the end of the novella the divorced pair reconciles, providing a future in which they share their lives, without one partner dominating the other. Stifter's challenge to traditional family structure is accompanied by a challenge to nationalism. Like Ebner-Eschenbach's Bogena,

Briaitta contains characters who represent different nationalities, and these characters value their own nations.

' Stifter had not travelled to Hungary before writing this novella, and Moriz Enzinger argues that he created the setting by mixing local descriptions that he had read, or of which he had heard. "Auf die eigentliche PuBta, das Horthobâgyer Weidegebiet in Ostungarn, wohin er nie gekommen ist, trifft seine Schilderung von Steinigkeit und Unfruchtbarkeit . . . wenig zu . . ." (135).

187 but they still respect other cultures and traditions. In the chapters on Soil und Haben and Aus quter Familie I discussed how ideas of a hierarchical nation and state are linked to a belief in hierarchical family structures. In Briaitta

Stifter shows a rather unconventional family that lacks hierarchical organization. He also shows the individuals of that family involved in a form of nation-building that does not lead to the subjugation of other nations. Stephan and

Brigitta work for the economic and cultural improvement of

Hungary.

The novella is structured as a frame tale. The narrator, a nameless German traveller, tells the story of his year-long visit on the Hungarian estate of Stephan

Murai^ and Murai's neighbor Brigitta Maroshely. While there, he learns to appreciate their form of family, their work to improve the land and the lives of the people around them, and their love of their homeland. By the time he goes home at the end of the novella, it is clear that he wishes to put into practice what he has learned from them. Views on family life and how families are to be structured are directly related to how individuals see society itself. By promoting

^ Throughout the novella, the narrator consistently refers to Murai as "der Major," except for when he retells the story of Brigitta's past. To avoid confusion, I will refer to "der Major" only as Stephan or Murai.

188 a different kind of family life, Stifter also suggests hope

for a different kind of society and nation.

NATION AND HOME

A glance at the critical literature written on Briaitta

gives the impression that nationalism plays only a

negligible role in the novella. Gerda von Petrikovits does

notice that part of the novella reveals the role of the

family in maintaining the state (93), and that the work

performed on the estates of Maroshely and Uwar is really the

"aufbauende Tâtigkeit im Dienste der Nation" (102). Indeed,

no chauvinistic nationalism appears in the novella, none of the main characters tries to claim superiority for their own nation or establish a national power, and the word Nation does not appear in the text at all.

Instead, the words Heimat and Land are used frequently.

The nationalism in Briaitta takes the form of love of ones home, dedication to the social and economic improvement of the nation, and respect for other national cultures. Stifter may have consciously avoided the word Nation because the idea of nationality had the potential to cause great strife.

Moreover, one of Hungary's leading national reformers,

Istvân (Stephen) Széchenyi (1791-1860), also emphasized economic improvement as part of the plan for Hungarian national independence.

189 [J]ust as the solution to the nationality problem in Hungary was inseparably connected with the solution of the economic problem, so was the rise of Hungary to a more independent position in relation to the empire dependent on the enactment of economic reforms, only a Hungary with a free and prosperous citizenry, not a Hungary of destitute bondsmen ruled by a small aristocracy and a large gentry, could rise to the level of independence which Széchenyi desired. (Kann, Multinational 119)

By stressing a connection to home and the land, Stifter may

have hoped to find a commonality among many nationalities.

Brigitta and Stephan work at fostering community and

cooperation along with improving the land.

Too much emphasis on nationality helped lead to the

brutal 1848-1849 war between Hungary and the Austrian

empire, and among ethnic/national groups within Hungary.

Stifter blamed the war on the Magyars: "Der Kampf ist

nichts, als die Fortsetzung des schon vor Jahren begonnenen

Strebens, das Hagyarthum zur Herrschaft zu bringen und allés

Andere zu unterwerfen" ("Ueber Palmerstons Rede" 73). By

1830 the Magyar language had become an official state

language in Hungary, along with Latin, "und bald begann sich ein ungarischer Nationalismus zu entwickeln" (Enzinger 141).

What began as an attempt by aristocrats to retain traditional feudal privileges the Austrian monarchy was trying to limit,^ spread as the Magyar aristocracy tried to

^ The governments of Maria Theresa (1740-1780) and Joseph II (1780-1790) regulated relations between lord and serf. They limited the amount of work a lord could demand of his serfs

190 foster nationalism among the Magyar peasants to hinder them

from forming coalitions with peasants of other nationalities. Magyars made up approximately half of

Hungary's population, and the other half consisted of

Germans, Slovaks, Ruthenes, Romanians, Serbs and Croats/* At the same time, the period of 1825-1848 saw substantial reform in agriculture, communications and travel. By 1840 it was possible for some serf-tenants to buy land and gain personal freedom (Kann, Multinational 118) .

Due to a complicated series of events, the Magyar national struggle grew violent in 1848. The Austrian emperor sanctioned the establishment of a new Hungarian parliament after an initially bloodless revolution. This overwhelmingly

Magyar parliament passed significant economic and civil reforms,® but it failed to mention the role of ethnic minorities, and it established Magyar as the official

and tried to control manor courts to protect serfs from arbitrary judicial decisions (Janos 28-29).

“* Magyars made up slightly more or slightly less than half of the population, depending on whether one counts Transylvania and/or Croatia as part of Hungary (Deâk 216; Kann, Multinational 110) . Either way, almost half (or slightly more than half) of the population consisted of several ethnic (or national) minorities.

® Parliament passed new laws of taxation, which revoked the exemption aristocrats had previously enjoyed, declared all Christian religious denominations equal before the law (Judaism was not included in these reforms, but even recognizing Protestantism was a new step), required trial by jury, and declared all citizens equal.

191 language/ Non-Magyars therefore had little respect for this

parliament. After a series of disagreements between the

Hungarian parliament and the Austrian crown, the Hungarian

parliament established its own national guard. When war

between Hungary and Austria broke out, many of the ethnic

minorities sided with the crown, while others fought

Hungarian forces and each other for their own independence.^

Before this bloody struggle, from 1842-1846, Stifter

wrote and rewrote the novella Briaitta. It was a time of

great hope for economic improvement and national cooperation

in Hungary. Stifter expresses this hope through the

character of Stephan. The narrator had met him in Italy, and

wonders what Stephan will be like when they meet again in

his homeland. When the narrator finally sees him for the

first time, Stephan is outfitted in local dress. He thinks

this different dress fits his host's personality extremely well.

* All of this happened again less than twenty years later. The compromise in 1867 resulted in the establishment of the dual monarchy of Austria Hungary. This compromise gave national recognition only to the Magyars, not any of the other national groups of the Austrian Empire. Indeed, throughout this period, Magyar politicians increasingly lost respect for non-Magyar languages, traditions and customs in Hungary. The Magyar language was again established as the official language of Hungary, and the names of many towns and villages were changed to Magyar forms (Barany 267).

’ For more information on these complicated circumstances, see Deâk's detailed description of the individual events in 1848-1849.

192 Es war ganz natürlich, dafi er so sein muôte, ich konnte plôtzlich nicht mehr denken, wie ihm der Frack stehe, seine Tracht schien mir reizend, dafi mir me in deutscher Flaus, der bestaubt und herabgeschunden auf einer Bank unter dem verschossenen Seidenkleide eines Tartaren lag, fast erbârmlich vorkam. (18)

This is the first indication that Stephan belongs here on this estate in Hungary: not because he was born here, but because he has chosen it to be his home, and he is committed to its care and cultivation. Stephan and Brigitta both show concern for the plight of individuals, as when they meet at

Maroshely, engaging the narrator in

. . . Gesprachen der verschiedensten Art, von der Zukunft des Landes, von Hebung und Verbesserung des gemeinen Mannes, von Bearbeitung und Beniitzung des Bodens, von Ordnung und Einschrânkungen des Donaustromes, von ausgezeichneten Persônlichkeiten der Vaterlandsfreunde . . . . (54)

These discussions focus on subjects central to one strain of

Hungarian nationalism in the first half of the nineteenth century. Széchenyi, "one of the most ethical thinkers of his nation" (Barany, Stephen 5) , saw a connection between the nationality problems in Hungary and social reform. The landowners were predominantly Magyar, while serfs and laborers were Slovak, Ruthenian and Romanian. Széchenyi promoted a nationalism that embraced Hungarians of all nationalities, and his proposals for economic reform were designed to aid all classes.

Moriz Enzinger notices the connection between the reform ideas promoted in Briaitta and Széchenyi's proposals:

193 "So 1st es kaxim ein Zufall, daS der Gutsbesitzer von Uwar auch Stephan heiôt. Was Széchenyi anstrebte und lehrte, sucht Stephan Mural mit seinen Krâften in die Tat umzusetzen" (145). The literary figure Murai shares many characteristics with the historical figure Széchenyi.

Széchenyi spent most of his life outside Hungary when he was a young man, joining the military, travelling around Europe, then returning to a home he did not know (Barany, Stephen 5

& 45). The narrator gives little detail on Murai's time abroad, but it is clear that he travelled around Europe for many years, and the narrator repeatedly refers to him as

"der Major," indicating that Murai also served in the military. Széchenyi maintained that "failure in agriculture was mainly due to old-fashioned farming methods and reliance on forced labor" (Barta 224) and worked for the modernization of Hungarian agriculture. Murai's attempt to modernize Hungary centers on improving agriculture.

Political goals are central to the novella, argues

Enzinger:

Ungarn trat damais auch in Osterreich in einen Brennpunkt des Interesses. Politisch-soziale und kulturelle Umbildungen bahnten sich an und wurden zum Teil durchgefiihrt, die Vorherrschaft des Adels erschien erschiittert, und eine demokratische Bewegung ins Leben gerufen. (140)

Indeed, Stephan does see himself as involved in nation- building. For him that process begins with the land.

194 "Ich glaube," sagte er eiimal, "daB man es so mit dem Boden eins Landes beginnen müsse. Unsere Verfassung, unsere Geschichte 1st sehr alt, aber noch vieles 1st zu tun; wir sind in ihr, gleichsam wie eine Blume, in einem Gedenkbuche aufgehoben worden. Dieses weite Land ist ein grdBeres Kleinod, als man denken mag, aber es muB noch immer mehr gefaBt werden." (27)

Stephan feels his responsibility to both the land and to the people. Any improvements he makes on the land will also help the people there. This form of nationalism has more social than political connotations. Stephan's attitude of responsibility inspires the narrator, and by the end of the novella, his education is complete. He has learned the value of having a home, and the concept of home includes both a strong family and love for his nation.

UNCONVENTIONAL BEAUTY, UNCONVENTIONAL LIFE

Despite the prominence of blatant social themes in

Briaitta. most of the scholarly work on Stifter's novella has centered on the understanding of beauty expressed in the novella. "Die Erzahlung setzt mit einer allgemeinen

Reflexion über das Wesen der inneren Schonheit ein," explains Benno von Wiese (196) . The opening page of Briaitta does show the narrator musing on the nature of beauty and human relationships.

In dem Angesichte eines HaBlichen ist fiir uns oft eine innere Schonheit, die wir nicht auf der Stelle von seinem Werte herzuleiten vermogen, wahrend uns oft die Züge eines andern kalt und leer sind, von denen alle sagen, daB sie die

195 grôfite Schônheit besitzen. Ebenso fühlen wir uns manchmal zu einem hingezogen, den wir eigentlich gar nicht kennen, es gefallen uns seine Bewegungen, es gefâllt uns seine Art, wir trauern, wenn er uns verlassen hat, und haben eine gewisse Sehnsucht, ja eine Liebe zu ihm, wenn wir oft noch in spâteren Jahren seiner gedenken: wâhrend wir mit einem andern, dessen Wert in vielen Taten ver uns liegt, nicht ins reine kommen kônnen, wenn wir auch jahrelang mit ihm umgegangen sind. (3)

These thoughts concentrate more on people and relationships than on beauty itself. Moreover, this passage concludes that physical beauty is irrelevant to human relationships.

The understanding of beauty in Briaitta. argues Walther

Hahn, has to do with the tension between "Schein und Sein," and the tension between surface beauty and "true" inner beauty (149). Richard Rogan focuses on the perception of beauty, and argues that the focus of the novella is to teach how to develop "das rechte Auge" that can appreciate unconventional beauty, just as the narrator eventually learns (250). These discussions of beauty in Stifter's novella concentrate on the theoretical aspects of understanding beauty.

Brigitta knows she is lacking in beauty, but she learns this only through other people's reactions to her: her mother pays more attention to Brigitta's two beautiful sisters, guests ignore the ugly third daughter, and Brigitta is left alone to play with stones in a corner. Because she is perceived as ugly, an intelligent being is pushed aside.

Margaret Gump explains that the two main themes of Briaitta

196 are that one should not become inactive because of a loss, but "must dedicate his life to a worthwhile task" and that there exists a "possible disparity between physical and spiritual beauty" (52-53). Patricia Howe points out that despite the novella's réévaluation of beauty, beauty remains in the eye of a male beholder. The narrator and Brigitta's suitor evaluate her beauty (439).

The critics' focus on beauty, however, ignores social factors affecting notions of beauty. Stifter's challenge to conventional beauty has more than aesthetic connotations, because the social implications of an ugly heroine are inherently critical of the status quo. Beauty is a cultural construct, and conceptions of beauty vary among people of different times, places and classes. In describing what she calls the "beauty myth," the belief that women must strive to be beautiful in order to maintain their roles in society,

Naomi Wolf points to the social effects of notions of beauty. "The qualities that a given period calls beautiful in women are merely symbols of the female behavior that that period considers desirable: The beauty myth is always actually prescribing behavior and not appearance** (13-14) .

Notions of female beauty have therefore not remained constant, but have varied along with differing expectations of women. The custom of foot-binding in China, for example, was to achieve the beauty of tiny feet. Beauty alone.

197 however, was not the only result. "There were, of course,

social consequences to the bound foot, perhaps anticipated,

perhaps not. The lotus lady was not one to travel much

abroad — not on her own two feet in any case. She was homebound and therefore chaste" (Vlcdios 45) . The notion of beauty in tiny feet resulted in physical limitations for women and actually rendered them more fit to take part in a society where women were expected to be subservient and dependent.

If a link exists between ideas of female beauty and a woman's expected role in society, then questioning a notion of female beauty also challenges the validity of those roles ascribed to women, and the basic nature of male-female relationships. Questioning male-female relationships inherently challenges marital and familial conventions.

Relationships that emphasize female beauty imply that a woman must be physically beautiful to attract male attention and that a woman's role in that relationship is to be passive.

While the novella repeatedly emphasizes Brigitta's lack of beauty, it also highlights Stephan's beauty from the very beginning. The narrator describes how he met Stephan in

Italy, and though Stephan was already close to fifty years old, young women were attracted to him, "denn nie hat man einen Mann gesehen, dessen Bau und Anlitz schoner genannt

198 werden konnte, noch einen, der dieses ÂuSere edler zu tragen verstand" (5). Since beauty is usually associated with female characteristics, the prominence given this male beauty further questions notions of male and female roles.

Critics agree that Stifter's novella challenges conventional notions of beauty. Brigitta is a remarkably ugly heroine. The narrator's glimpse of a portrait of

Brigitta as a young woman surprises him.

So stand auf dem Tische seines [des Majors] Schreibzimmers . . . ein Bild — es war in schonem Goldrahmen das verkleinerte Bild eines Madchens von vielleicht zwanzig — zweiundzwanzig Jahren — aber sonderbar war es, wie auch der Maler die Sache verschleiert haben mochte, es war nicht das Bild eines schdnen, sondern eines hafilichen Mâdchens — die dunkle Farbe des Angesichts und der Bau der Stirn waren seltsam, aber es lag etwas, wie stàrke und Kraft darinnen, und der Blick war wild, wie bei einem entschlossenen Wesen. (30-31)

What the narrator describes in this portrait describes

Brigitta's character well. She may be lacking in conventional physical beauty, but the main adjective he uses to describe her ugliness is "seltsam." This description seems to emphasize that she is considered ugly primarily because she is different. The look in her eyes is wild, again indicating a rebellion against convention. Respectable middle-class women of this period are expected to be cultivated, mild and nurturing, not wild. These unusual physical features make her appear ugly, but even in the portrait, her strength is apparent.

199 For Brigitta's contemporaries, however, strength seems

to be the opposite of beauty. Contrasting Brigitta to her

sisters, the narrator explains, "Die Schwestern waren weich

und schon geworden, sie [Brigitta] blofi schlank und stark"

(38) . In describing a person's body, "weich" and "schlank"

could be interpreted as opposites. While "schlank" is not

quite the same thing as "hart," describing a female body as

soft implies "womanly" curves and physical weakness. The

adjective "schlank," or slender, implies physical fitness,

activity and the lack of those "womanly" curves. If the

first adjectives in each pair, "weich" and "schlank" can be

read as opposites, perhaps the second adjectives in each

pair, "schon" and "stark," should be read as opposites as well. This interpretation suggests that for these people, a woman's physical strength is the opposite of beauty.

Another unconventional aspect of Brigitta's features is her masculinity. At a time when the corset, which emphasized the curves of the female body, had come back into vogue, "to

look mannish was to look freakish" for a woman (Knibiehler

326). As a teenager Brigitta already preferred "male" activities over "female" ones and developed "masculine" characteristics:

In ihrem Korper war fast Manneskraft, was sich dadurch erwies, daB sie eine Schwester, wenn sie ihr Tandeleien sagen oder sie liebkosen wollte, mit dem schlanken Arme bloB ruhig wegbog, oder daB sie, wie sie gerne tat. Hand an knechtliche Arbeit legte, bis ihr die Tropfen auf der Stirne standen.

200 Musik machen lernte sie nicht, aber sie ritt gut und kühn, wie ein Mann .... (38)

Already as a child, Brigitta ignored convention to do what

she wanted. The first time the narrator sees the adult

Brigitta, he thinks from a distance that she is a man. He is

startled when he discovers, "Dies aber war nichts anderes,

als ein Weib, etwa vierzig Jedire alt, welches sonderbar

genug die weiten landesmâfiigen Beinkleider anhatte, und auch

wie ein Mann zu Pferde saB" (10). Her choice of clothing and

equestrian style shows that she seeks practicality over

fashion and convention.* Brigitta is working here, and riding astride a horse is safer and more stable than riding

sidesaddle; trousers are more practical than a long skirt both for riding and for working. Obviously, the narrator has never tried to ride a horse sidesaddle, or noticed the difficulty in balancing while riding sidesaddle, which

Brigitta would have to do if she were wearing a skirt. The narrator's surprise at Brigitta's dress and lifestyle shows that, for all his travelling and his refusal to lead a domestic, middle-class lifestyle himself, he still expects women to live conventional lives.

Peter Branscombe sees Brigitta's masculine characteristics as a liability: "Brigitta has a clear sense of identity and position; but as long as she maintains her

* Stifter often portrays women in practical, rather than fashionable, clothing. See Lorenz 313.

201 masculine outlook, her marriage cannot be meaningfully reconstituted" (151). He views her "masculinity" as a deviance, brought on by her experience "as a baby starved of maternal love" (150). He forgets that masculinity and femininity are only components of constructed identities that individuals assume in society, and that Brigitta all along has been mother to Gustav as well, successfully managing both roles. "Brigitta, der langjahrig alleinstehende Vorstand ihres Hauses, ist pater und mater familias in einer Person, worauf auch ihr Wechseln von mannlicher und weiblicher Kleidung hindeutet" (Lorenz 317).

Brigitta responsibly handles both "masculine” and "feminine" roles, as needed.

Indeed, this "masculinity" is part of Brigitta's strength. The narrator repeatedly emphasizes her physical strength, her intelligence and her independence. She needs these features to be on equal footing with Stephan.

Nineteenth-century notions of femininity defined women as weak and dependent. Proponents for women's rights have long argued that equality between the sexes can exist only when women achieve economic independence, which would eliminate women's dependence on husbands or fathers for daily survival.* Brigitta has achieved economic independence

* Louise Otto-Peters argued for improved earning opportunities for women, since a woman who had no income from outside of the home was really only a servant of her

202 through her inheritance and her hard work. Brigitta and

Stephan have developed the kind of ideal marriage described by Hegel, in which each partner affirms the consciousness of the other, precisely because they are on equal footing.^ By the standards of the mid-nineteenth century, the qualities she needs to manage her estate successfully are "masculine."

Brigitte's masculinity is contrasted with Stephan's

"feminine" characteristics. Dagmar Lorenz comments on the

"beinahe weibliches Sorgebedürfnis" (314) that he shows toward his son. He is beautiful, emotional and, as a young man, frivolous." The narrator claims "daB er [Stephan] mehr als einmal auch Mânner betorte" (5). The narrator's description of Stephan's reputation in Italy shows a frivolous man who cannot commit to a relationship, and "es sei noch niemanden, selbst der groBten Schônheit, die diese

Erde trage, gelungen, ihn langer zu fesseln, als es ihm eben

husband, and did not even receive the wages of a servant. "Dies ware ein andrer wesentlicher Schritt, die Weibliche Wiirde aufrechtzuhalten . . ." (300).

Though Hegel claims marriage to be an ideal realm where a man and a woman provide equal recognition for the other, he defines male and female as oppositional and inherently unequal. If they are unequal, husband and wife cannot provide this mutual recognition he claims as central to the marriage relationship. The relationship in Briaitta. however, is based on an equality that is lacking in Hegel's model. See discussion on Hegel and marriage in Chapter 2.

" While I do not consider frivolity as a specifically feminine characteristic, it is important to note that many people in nineteenth-century Europe believed it was.

203 beliebte” (5). The first time the narrator hears information

about Brigitta's past, her estranged husband is described as

a "junger, leichtsinniger Mensch” (34) . All of these

characteristics could be described as "feminine" by

nineteenth-century standards.

Many of the above-cited characteristics, however, are

simply those of an immature person. As Stephan grows older,

he becomes more serious about responsibility. He learns to

run his estate with efficiency, taking his masculine role as

head of the household, establishing a "patriarchal

relationship . . . [with] his servants and shepherds" (Gump

53). His acceptance of his responsibilities puts him on

equal footing with Brigitta, who has been more serious all

along. Stephan's need to learn this responsibility from

Brigitta is an unusual aspect of their relationship, since

it was usually expected that women should mature and learn

from their husbands, and not the other way around.

Brigitta defies convention in many aspects of their

marriage. From the beginning of their relationship, she

tells Stephan that she requires a higher love that is "ohne

MaB und Ende" (44). His infidelity destroys that love in her

eyes. Brigitta's harsh condemnation of her husband's sexual

interest outside their marriage is most remarkable, considering that the novella was written at a time when

204 female sexuality outside marriage was strongly condemned, while male infidelity was ignored and almost condoned.

Although the canon law of the Roman church treated the adultery of wives and husbands as equally criminal, secular laws generally penalized only wives .... A wife who committed adultery damaged not only her own honor, but that of her husband and family as well. The "authentic place" assigned to wives included this duty of embodying and preserving family honor, so that women were also expected to cover up any wrongdoing by their husbands. (Gottlieb 100)

Even though Stephan does not physically commit adultery with

Gabriele, it is enough for Brigitta that he strays spiritually, since their love is based on that spiritual link. Stephan redeems himself by returning to Brigitta on her terms.

Brigitta is not a typical housewife, and she and

Stephan do not have a typical family life. By creating the character of Brigitta as lacking beauty — the most important feature a woman can have, Stifter prepares her for a role in the family that goes beyond "traditional" tasks.

Brigitta and Stephan divide labor based on skill and need rather than by gender. Their personal relationship also ignores gender stereotypes. They support and help each other as needed, not based on some prescribed notion of male and female roles.

205 BRIGITTA's RADICAL FAMILY

Despite the prominence of this unorthodox family,

critics have given the novella's challenge to traditional

feunily structure little attention. In her book-length study

of Stifter's views on the family, Karen Danford Pawluk gives

Briaitta only one short paragraph. Peter Branscombe notes

that the narrator learns "the value of feunily life" (152)

from Stephan and Brigitta, but says little about the nature

of that family. Martin and Erika Swales see how parts of

Briaitta are "a hymn in praise of marital love" (103) , but

fail to discuss the results of that marital love and how it

forms a family. Dagmar Lorenz alone points to the

revolutionary aspects of Stifter's family; "Stifters Frauen

[sind] auch nicht ausschliefilich auf ihre Rollen innerhalb

der Familie hin orientiert, sondern zeigen . . . auBerhalb

dieses engen Kreises Engagement" (311). Brigitta and

Stephan's revolutionary family seems surprising from an

author generally regarded as a representative of the

conservative Biedermeier period.*^

Their family is formed by a relationship based on

friendship and equality. The narrator says he became "fast

" Sengle characterizes the Biedsirmeier period as representative of the "herrschenden konservativen Richtung" (155) of the early nineteenth century. Many standard anthologies and lexica (including the Metz1er Literatur Lex ikon and Frenzel's Daten deutscher Dichtuna) have continued to accept this definition.

206 wie ein Glied der Familien [von Brigitta und Stephan] "

(56) " and learned the value of such families. Brigitta and

Stephan have consciously decided on the terms of their

relationship, the narrator learns:

Der Major sagte einmal zu mir, daB sie in einer Stunde, wo sie, wie es selten zwischen Menschen geschieht, miteinander inniger über sich sprachen, festgestellt haben, daB Freundschaft der schonsten Art, daB Aufrichtigkeit, daB gleiches Streben und Mitteilung zwischen ihnen herrschen sollte .... (57)

Brigitta and Stephan help each other, look to each other for advice and share a mutual respect. Indeed, the description of their friendship bears striking similarities to many

idealistic nineteenth-century characterizations of marriage, as outlined in the 1861 household manual by Henriette

Davidis:

Das eheliche Leben wird bekanntlich von groBen Mannern die Schule aller Schulen genannt, in welcher die Frau durch den Mann, der Mann durch die Frau gelSutert werden kann. Wohl ihnen, wenn der Standpunkt erreicht wird, durch welchen ein Geist, ein Streben auf immer sie verbindet. (300)

Stephan's characterization of his relationship with

Brigitta, based on "gleiches streben und Mitteilung" seems the same as the "ein Geist" and "ein Streben" that Davidis mentions. The difference between the relationships that the

" At the time of this statement in the novella, the narrator has not yet revealed the fact that Brigitta and "der Major" have been married. He only presents them as neighbors who work closely together, and each of their households forms a separate family.

207 narrator and Davidis describe lies in how this "ein Geist"

and "ein Streben" are to be achieved. Davidis advises that

young women learn to manage a household in order to aid

their husbands:

Dem Hause würdig vorzustehen, dasselbe nach Moglichkeit zum angenehmsten Aufenthalt des Mannes zu machen, nur ihm gef alien zu wollen, auf alle seine Wünsche, insofern sie zum wahren hâuslichen Glücke dienen, die groBte Riicksicht zu nehmen, moglichst zu vermeiden suchen, was Sorgen nach sich ziehen kônnte, nie zu vergessen, daB der Mann der Versorger der Fauailie ist — das sei und bleibe die schônste Aufgabe des weiblichen Berufs. (302)

In the marriage that Davidis outlines the common goals

toward which a married couple should work are the husband's goals, and his wife is to make them her own. Brigitta and

Stephan, in contrast, each have their own goals, and when possible, they help each other to reach them.

Brigitta and Stephan do not have a traditional

"eheliches Leben." They are equals, each working to better their neighboring estates, which are organized in the form of the traditional ganzes Haus. They are responsible for bringing agricultural reform to their area, they have employed vagrants and vagabonds, and they have formed an agricultural coalition to share information on land improvement. In many ways they seem to be playing the

208 cliche-ridden roles of the benevolent lords of the manor they ride around the estates checking on projects, they eat

in a great hall along with the servants and workers, and they seem genuinely concerned about the well-being of the people who work for them. Despite their benevolence, however, the benefits of the work performed by the serfs belong to the landowners alone.

While Stephan and Brigitta form a family based on equality and respect, the organization of their estates

Maroshely and Uwar is not democratic. Both Brigitta and

Stephan show concern for the well-being of the people on their estates, they pay their laborers fair wages and cultivate a good working relationship with them, but

Brigitta and Stephan are the landowners, and, at a time when serfdom was still common in Hungary, their serfs have no choice but to work for them. Perhaps because of the rural, agricultural setting, the scenes in which the households are shown eating and working together seem more plausible in

Briaitta than they do in Soil und Haben. In this setting,

Stephan makes the narrator feel welcome and invites him to join in the daily activity. They ride out on the land

This portrayal of the aristocracy as benevolent plays a role in the perception of Stifter as a conservative. His enthusiasm for reform, however, indicates some liberal tendencies, and his portrayal of Brigitta as a competent and independent manager of her estate shows him to be a social revolutionary in regard to gender roles.

209 together to oversee the work, and the narrator is impressed

by the industry of the people he sees. Stephan has convinced

even "Bettler, Herumstreicher, selbst Gesindel" to work on

the estate "durch pünktliche Bezahlung" (20) . The need to

point out specifically that it is the punctual payment that

entices these people to work seems to imply that others who

have hired workers have not always paid on time. Serfdom was

not abolished in Hungary until 1848, and Stephan seems to be

a positive example of a just and responsible Gutsherr. When

he speaks of the many people loyal to him, it sounds almost

overdone and melodramatic, but Stifter seems to be

emphasizing the two-way responsibility of the serf-lord

relationship. Not only are the serfs bound to the land and

to the leadership of their lord, but the lord is also bound to take responsibility for their well-being. Stephan

explains the feelings he has about being there.

Seit ich in der Mitte meiner Leute lebe, über die ich eigentlich mehr Recht habe, als Ihr Euch denket, seit ich mit ihnen in ihrer Kleidung gehe, ihre Sitten teile, und mir ihre Achtung erworben habe, ist es mir eigentlich als hatte ich dieses und jenes GlUck errungen, das ich sonst immer in der einen oder der anderen Entfernung gesucht habe. (28)

Stephan's role as landowner, lord and master is problematic, but he repeatedly emphasizes the responsibility he has toward these people. They must remain loyal to him, since they are subject to him "wegen dem Verhaltnisse der

Grundherrlichkeit" (29). In return, he must lead them in a

210 fair and just manner. His payment of the day laborers

indicates that he teüces this responsibility seriously. They trust him, and he must lead them toward good.

On one hand, this image of Brigitta and Stephan as benevolent landowners is problematic, since I am trying to argue that Stifter envisioned a new order of society. Where he differs from the traditional ganzes Haus, however, is in having a woman capably and successfully heads one household.

Brigitta lives alone with her son on her estate, she runs her land independently, and she is a respected leader of the community, other landowners, including Stephan, come to her for advice and help in agricultural matters and estate management. Before Stephan arrived in the area, she was one of the two founding members of a Bund of estate owners who joined together to advance agricultural techniques. At the end of the novella, Stephan moves to Maroshely to rejoin his wife and son, and it seems unlikely that he will now take over and run Brigitta's estate. More likely, they will continue to work together to manage both of their properties. At a time when bourgeois literature promotes the idea that a woman's only goal in life is to help her husband, this family is truly revolutionary. Brigitta's leading role in the community and her activity as an

211 independent woman in charge of her own affairs defy

convention.^

THE NARRATOR'S SEARCH FOR HOME

There are actually three families in Briaitta. The

feunily most central to the plot consists of Brigitta,

Stephan and their son Gustav, but both of the other families

are significant as well. In the section

"Steppenvergangenheit," the narrator tells about the second

family— the one in which Brigitta grew up. In this family,

Brigitta learned that she was ugly, since even her mother

found it difficult to love her, and Brigitta grew up with

little companionship. Patricia Howe compares Brigitta's youth to a Mërchen: "Like many fairy-tale heroines, Brigitta

is the youngest and oddest of three daughters" (428). This

family, in which the beautiful daughters were indulged while the "ugly duckling" was ignored, provides a contrast to the family formed by Stephan and Brigitta.

The third family is that of the narrator himself. He gives little information about his family, but his family is meaningful to the novella as well. Near the end of the novella the narrator explains why he is telling this story:

Among the aristocracy, it is less unusual for a woman to play a prominent role in the estate, especially during times of emergency, such as war. See Antonia Fraser, The Weaker Vessel.

212 the events he experienced on his visit to Hungary changed his life. Given the respect he has for Stephan and Brigitta, it seems probable that he has followed their example of family and is now telling the story so that others can learn from them as well. Their feunily challenges traditional notions of role divisions within families.

Concentrating on the narrator can provide some insight into the novella, though little information on his character appears. He is German, he was very young and he enjoyed travelling at the time the story took place. Stephan invited him to visit his estate in Hungary, and he accepted. While in Hungary he experienced something that made him want to go home, start a family, and take an active role in his community.

In some ways Briaitta can be read as a Bildungsroman, or at least an episode out of one. David Miles defines the

Bildungsroman "as a novel that 'educates' by portraying an education" (981). The Metz1er Literatur Lexikon. defines the genre in more detail.

[Der Bildungsroman ist ein] Romantypus, in welchem die innere Entwicklung (Bildung) eines Menschen von einer sich selbst noch unbewufiten Jugend zu einer allseits gereiften Personlichkeit gestaltet wird, die ihre Aufgabe in der Gemeinschaft bejaht und erfüllt. (53)

Both of these definitions describe Briaitta. While the novella does not contain the scope or variety of experience typical in a recognized Bildungsroman (e.g. Wilhelm Meister.

213 Per ortine. Heinrich), it still fits the general pattern. The story focuses on a young man and a time in his life when he is unsettled and prone to a great amount of Wanderlust.

Comparing Briaitta to Soll_und Haben (a novel generally recognized as a Bildungsroman) helps highlight some of the novella's similarities to this genre. Anton's trip to Poland in Soli und Haben supplies a significant part of his education as a businessman and a German. He learns of the superiority of the German nation and culture to Polish tradition, and learns to work with other people, as well as how to oversee an estate and conduct business. The narrator of Briaitta learns the value of work and the value of nation, as well, but in a different way. Anton, arriving in

Poland, sees only dirty, backward people, whose future, he believes, lies in their Germanization. The only "useful” people, in his eyes, are the other Germans in Poland. He wants to bring German culture to Poland. The narrator of

Briaitta. on the other hand, travels to a land that he sees as different, but also a place to learn about new ways. He makes an effort to spend time with local people and learn about their customs. There he meets people who are working for the improvement of the nation, not because they view their nation as superior to others, but because it is their home. The narrator also admires Brigitta and Stephan's relationship.

214 When Stephan suggests that the narrator may find it

more comfortable and practical to wear the local clothing,

too, the narrator agrees. His willingness to accept

different customs indicates an openness to other cultures.

He seems to try to fit in when he travels, and later claims

that he always tries to learn the language of the localities

that he visits. Learning the language indicates a respect

for local culture, and validates its importance, rather than

expecting everyone to cater to the visiting German. His

efforts contrast with those of Anton in Soil und Haben.

Anton does not bother to learn to speak and understand

Polish. He feels it is not worth his trouble to deal with the "backward" people he meets in Poland.

Already at the beginning of the novella, the narrator of Briaitta is open to a range of experience. He travels to

Hungary with an interest in seeing what is there and

learning from it. Shown into his room at Uwar when he arrives, the narrator finds comfortable quarters.

Die Gerâte waren anders, als sie bei uns gebrauchlich sind .... Es waren stiihle, Tische, Schranke, Waschgerâte, Schreibzeug, und allés da, was ein einsamer Wanderer in seiner Wohnung nur wiinschen kann. Selbst Bûcher lagen auf dem Nachttische, und sie waren samtlich in deutscher Sprache. In jedem der zwei Zimmer stand ein Bett, aber statt der Decke war auf ein jedes das weite volkstümliche Kleidungsstück gebreitet, welches sie Bunda heifien. Es ist dies gewohnlich ein Mantel aus Fellen, wobei die rauhe Seite nach innen, die glatte weiBe nach auBen gekehrt ist. (16)

215 Even though he is unaccustomed to the style of the

furnishings, he recognizes the usefulness and practicality

of the room. The Bunda keeps him warm at night, just as it

is designed to do. The soft fur, turned on the inside of the coat, does a better job of keeping him warm than if the fur were to the outside, as is customary in many Western

European countries.

At the time of his travels in Hungary, the narrator has little interest in his home and wants only to see the world.

He gives little information about himself, other than telling his feelings about travelling. He is German, and despite his desire to travel and see the world, he cannot help but think about his home. "Der Weinberg, an dessen

Rande wir eben ankamen, erinnerte mich an die des Rheins, nur habe ich am Rheine nicht dieses derbe Trotzen und

Strotzen von Blatt und Reben gesehen, wie hier (10-11). Many aspects of the landscape in Hungary are very different from what he has seen before. Curious about this different land, he travels, not directly to Stephan's home, but makes

"mehrere Kreuz- und Querzüge" (8) around the land, for no other reason than to see what is there.

It is clear that at the time that he is telling the story, the narrator feels differently about his youthful travels than he did when he was young. Introducing the story, he looks back to his youth.

216 Zu diesen Bemerkungen bin ich durch eine Begebenheit veranlafit worden, die ich einmal in sehr jungen Jahren auf dem Gute eines alten Majors erlebte, da ich noch eine sehr groBe Wanderlust hatte, die mich bald hier bald dort ein Stiick in die Welt hinein trieb, well ich weiB Gott was zu erleben und zu erforschen verhoffte. (3-4)

He speaks of having this "groBe Wanderlust" in the past tense, implying that he no longer has it. The line, "weil ich weiB Gott was zu erleben . . . verhoffte," adds a touch of irony to his tale. This irony distances him from the desires of his youth and implies that he has found something better in his old age. At this early point in the novella, he tells us he has changed, and this information stirs questions in the reader. How did he lose this Wanderlust?

Why does he now think he was silly just to wander around the continent when he was young?

By the end of the novella the answer to these questions is clear. "DaB ich nun einen Hausstand habe, daB ich eine liebe Gattin habe, fur die ich wirke, daB ich nun Gut urn

Gut, Tat um Tat in unsern Kreis hereinziehe, verdanke ich dem Major" (56). This is one of the few times in which the narrator speaks of his life after his travels in Hungary, and the statement is nestled in a paragraph describing

Stephan's invitation to narrator, encouraging to prolong his stay. It also supplements the end of the novella, which gives little information about what he did after he left

Hungary.

217 Im Frühjahre nahm ich wieder mein deutsches Gewand, meinen deutschen Stab, und wanderte dem deutschen Vaterland zu . . . . Mit trüben, sanften Gedanken zog ich weiter, bis die Leithe tiberschritten war, und die lieblichen blauen Berge des Vaterlandes vor meinen Augen d&mmerten. (64-65)

The term Vaterland implies feumilial ties to nation and home.

The narrator's desire to return home therefore is related to

both nation and family. But why does the story end here? On

one hand, it is structured as a standard frame tale in which

the narrator's arrival in Hungary and eventual departure

provide the frame to the story. But since it is clear from

the beginning that the narrator tells the story years after

these events, there are many ways in which the novella could

end. He could tell what happened on his way home, how he

arrived home, or how he found a wife. Instead, Stifter ends

the story with the narrator on his way home, and by the time

the reader reaches the end of the novella, it is already

known that the narrator arrived home. Ending the story here

leaves the impression that this is all the reader needs to

know. The narrator went and stayed with these people in a

foreign country, admired their different ways, learned about

their kind of family and dedication to community, then vrent home to try to build the same kind of family and community.

Focusing on the ending in this way helps define the purpose of telling the story: the narrator tells how meeting

218 Brigitta and Stephan made him lose his Wanderlust and want

to go home to start a family of his own.

CONCLUSION

"In Briaitta kulminiert . . . die Idee einer

genossenschaftlichen Zusammenarbeit ..." (Wildbolz 49).

That idea of cooperation provides the basis for

relationships within the family, within the nation, and

among nations. It is therefore no coincidence that Stifter

portrays familial relationships based on equality and mutual

respect in the same text as he shows understanding and

respect among nations. These two kinds of relationships —

in the family and among nations — are shaped by the same

rejection of brute domination. While the organization of

Stephan's and Brigitta's estates cannot be called

democratic, the responsibilities of everyone, laborer and

owner, are stressed. Stephan and Brigitta, who have been

given privileged positions of leadership, have the

responsibility to use those positions to better the larger

community.

Stifter has been criticized for his idealistic, happily-ever-after ending, but the novella was written at a time when he (and many Austrians) still hoped for positive social change. Before the brutal 1848 revolution in Hungary, the reformer Széchenyi was also idealistic and thought he

219 could convince his fellow Hungarians to strengthen the nation through work, economic reform and social improvement.

The novella's idealistic ending indicates hope for the future. The reconciliation between Brigitta and Stephan strengthens their relationship and prepares them to continue to improve the land together. They manage to recognize the bond they share, and overcome their differences to lead productive lives together, in a way that Stifter perhaps hoped the Austrian Empire could do as well.

220 CHAPTER 7

CONCLUSION; NATIONS AND FAMILIES

Family ideology stands at the heart of societal organization because relationships within the family inform other relationships from the personal to the national level.

While the organization of the family does not mirror the organization of the nation or state, the notion of family is central to national ideology. The current trend in the

United States which places "family values" at the center of political rhetoric is nothing new. The family, in whatever form it takes, begins the process of socialization which prepares individuals to play a part in society. Kathe

Schirmacher wrote in 1918, "Die fahige Hausfrau erhalt den

Staat, die unfâhige vernichtet ihn" (6) , arguing that the existence of state and society depends on private households and the women who manage them. The state therefore always has an interest in how families function, since families produce and educate citizens.

An understanding of the family as a "natural" unit provided the basis for the idea of the "natural" origins of

221 the political unit of the nation. Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl spoke for many nineteenth-century theorists on the family when he wrote that, though most groups in society are based on culture and tradition, families are different.

Es gibt noch andere, noch ursprünglichere Gruppen im Volksleben, die gleichfalls den Staat nicht voraussetzen, trotzdem aber seine hdchste Beachtung heischen, und ihrerseits vom Staate vorausgesetzt werden. Diese Gruppen sind die Familien. (Riehl v)

If families were formed by nature, however, theorists such as Riehl would not need to tell people how their families should be organized and how individual roles should be performed, since they would take their forms "naturally."

Claiming that, since families are formed naturally, a nation or state can "naturally" grow from them, therefore leads to a circular argument. Families have changed in reaction to economic, political and social factors, suggesting that those forces have more to do with how families form than does nature. Indeed, the question of what is "natural" has been debated by philosophers and anthropologists to an extent that cannot be discussed here.

Not only have families changed in reaction to external factors, but changes within families have affected other societal organizations and customs. This reciprocal relationship between the "private" sphere of the family and the "public" sphere of economics and politics reveals a complicated affinity.

222 So vollzieht sich die Sozialgeschichte der Famille einmal in der Form von Anpassung an gesellschaftliche Regeln, die sich in den verschiedenen geschichtlichen Epochen durch unterschiedliche kulturelle Norm- und Brauchsysteme verwirklichen. Dazu bewirkt die Famille als dynamische Primârform zum anderen auch selbst derartige Regeln und die sie darstellenden kulturellen Objektivationen. Und in einem dialektischen ProzeB werden diese Phënomene des Überbaus, vielleicht als môgliche Lôsungen spezifischer sozialer Problème, dann wiederum selbst zu sozialen Tatsachen, die auf die Basis der Sozialsystem zurückwirken. (Weber-Ke 11 ermann 7-8)

The family is a mirror image of neither the nation nor the state, but all three exist in a state of constant negotiation.

A similar relationship exists between fictional literary texts and "reality." All fiction is produced within the context of the real world and is therefore affected by it, whether or not an author attempts a realistic portrayal of historical events. At the same time, people who read fictional texts can be affected by them, and in that sense, fiction can become a means to social reform.

I have discussed four literary texts in which families play a central role and national identity is highlighted.

Political and social issues do not, as Carl Steiner claims of BoZena. provide mere "background" to the production and reception of a literary text. Rather, such issues directly affect how an author perceives reality, and therefore how that author will portray it. Political and social issues

223 stand at the core of the four texts I have studied. These fictional texts portray ideology in a way that ’’factual" texts cannot. The texts' realism, that is, the authors' descriptions of contemporary settings and issues, provides information about the daily lives of some segments of the population in Germany and Austria in the second half of the nineteenth century. Because the texts are fiction, they can illustrate ideas, project visions, and suggest solutions to problems that exist in the family and the nation.

Sociologists and historians have dealt with this multifaceted relationship between family and nation. George

Mosse, for example, has linked the rise of the middle-class notion of respectability in Germany to the rise of nationalism. Strict adherence to gender roles within the family played a primary role in that understanding of respectability. In a related study, Isabel Hull has argued that "sexual behavior . . . is symbolically central to social classification and the interpretation of order"

(Sexualitv 1). Family provides the social institution in which sexual behavior is sanctioned and controlled, and the

"interpretation of order" also relates to national identity and an understanding of order among nations.

Literary studies have only begun to probe the link in those themes in fiction. Kirsten Belgum has shown how fictional segments of family journals targeted women with a

224 nationalist message. A panel at the 1996 convention of the

Modern Languages Association, "Gender and Germany before

1871," explored some ways in which the notion of deutsche

Tugend played an instrumental role in the development of

German national identity. This notion of Tugend placed women squarely in the private sphere of the family and deified the

Hausfrau as the quintessential German woman.

The four literary texts in this study have not previously been viewed within this context of family and national identity. Freytag's novel has been interpreted as a manifesto of German national identity, but the importance of families in that identity has been ignored. Similarly, in

Reuter's novel critics have noted the criticism of the patriarchal family, but have not linked the family structure to larger societal and national structures. Neither Ebner-

Eschenbach's nor Stifter's texts have been interpreted as including issues of national identity. The radical family structure in Stifter's novella has also been ignored. This dissertation explores the link between the seemingly private realm of the family and the ostensibly public realm of the nation.

Freytag's novel Soil und Haben places German identity in the context of the patriarchal family. The hero Anton is shown learning to take his place in a hierarchically structured state and preparing to take part in a form of

225 chauvinistic nationalism. The novel's depictions of Jews and

Poles clearly identify what is not German. These "inferior"

non-Germans should be, in the moral system of the novel,

colonized by Germans for their own good, because then they

too will reap the rewards of German culture. To become a

German and an active member of the nation, Anton must have a

wife who will care for him and his home. Sabine Schrôter is

this woman who puts feunily and household above all else. She

is a good German woman because she is a good Hausfrau. The

Germany Freytag envisions cannot form without women like

Sabine. In Freytag's novel the family provides the basis for

the nation, showing how the nation is affected by the

family.

Freytag's idea of Germany is criticized in Reuter's Aus outer Faroilie. and Reuter's novel explores how the nation­

state affects the family. The hierarchical governmental

structure that grows out of the ideology espoused by Freytag

is damaging to most people in it. The effective, energetic, and satisfied Hausfrau who provides the backbone to

Freytag's version of the nation becomes an overworked and exploited mother in Reuter's novel. The women in Reuter's novel are unhappy because they are given no choice in the role they will seek in life. Aus outer Familie explores the danger of accepting strict hierarchies in society and limiting women to the roles of wife and mother.

226 Though Reuter is extremely critical of existing social

forms, she offers no suggestions for solutions in Aus outer

Familie. Since she clearly identifies problems in the family

and links them to problems in the nation-state, her novel

raises the question of how things could be different. If the

ideology of nation and state is borrowed from the ideology

of families, will the understanding of nation change as

families change? Linking hierarchical, patriarchal families

to chauvinistic forms of nationalism is not new. Little

work, however, has been done in studying texts that present

non-patriarchal families and how they relate to nationalism.

My study of the two Austrian texts, BoZena and Briaitta.

reveals this connection. They focus more on the family than

on the nation, but when nation appears, it is markedly unlike the idea of nation expressed in the two German novels.

BoZena challenges all notions of stratification in society; class, national and gender hierarchies are all put to the test. BoZena, the Czech plebeian heroine, protects an

innocent victim from the machinations of bourgeois social- climbers. In doing so, she helps bring about the creation of a new class. When BoZena's bourgeois daughter marries a

German-Austrian nobleman, it signifies the joining of classes and nationalities. Despite the novel's middle-class moral stance, it implies that for the future of Austria,

227 people of all classes and nationalities must come together in cooperation.

Set in a pioneer environment, Brigitta also stresses cooperation. Though both Brigitta and Stephan have some familial ties to the land in Hungary (they have both inherited property there, implying that their families have roots in Hungary), the real reason they live in Hungary is that they choose to live there. Their personal, familial relationship is also based on choice, combined with equality and mutual respect. The family they form is one in which they work together toward common goals. Each participates according to ability, not some predetermined notion of

"natural” roles. Their relationship impresses the narrator so much that he decides to return home to Germany to try to build the same kind of home that they have. That idea of home includes the nation, which is not viewed as superior to any other nation, but simply home. Though Brigitta and

Stephan's efforts to improve the land of Hungary have some colonialist aspects, as they conc[uer the wilderness and build a new society, they also are willing to learn from the wilderness and the culture they find there.

The nationalism espoused in the two Austrian texts is one that demands rights and dignity for a nation without forcing domination over other nations. This idea of nation is based on an understanding of individual rights that do

228 not infringe upon the rights of others. Such an idea is not

surprising from two Austrian authors who lived at a time

when many forms of nationalism did contain respect for

individual rights, or the rights of other nations. Bo2ena

and Briaitta both portray an idealistic hope for a time when

no relationships— neither the personal nor the political—

are based on coercion. Neither of these texts creates a

perfect world. BoZena is able to save her daughter's

inheritance only after a lifetime of self-sacrifice and

negation of her personal desires. The future of Hungary, as

outlined in Briaitta. lies in the hands of a few elite

gentry, and the peasants and serfs who work their land have

no choice but to follow them. Both texts, however, explore

the possibilities of change and improvement for the lives of people from diverse classes and ethnic origin, not only bourgeois Germans as in Freytag's Soli und Haben. The two

Austrian texts suggest that a time of national-political equality and progress can only come when relationships within the family are built on love and respect.

Though Stifter promotes the idea of marriage between equals, the estates of his protagonists are still organized hierarchically. This acceptance of hierarchy may stem from his position as a teacher, employed by the state. He had an interest in preserving the hierarchal institutions of family and state. He seems to recognize only problems within

229 individuals in the family, while Reuter and Ebner-Eschenbach direct their criticism at the institutions themselves.

Freytag, believing order to be the most important factor in society, embraces hierarchy in family and state. The two female authors may be more critical of the institution, having been brought up as daughters in families that restricted their education, finances, social lives and marriage in ways they saw their brothers were not controlled. Their experiences in families make them see a problem of oppression deeply embedded in society, and that such a problem cannot be eradicated without the radical transformation of the institution.

Moreover, the texts show how the use of the family metaphor in national ideology can be used to support vastly different national goals. Freytag's novel uses a patriarchal family to provide the structure for a Prussian-German national state concerned less for individual rights than for asserting national superiority. Ebner-Eschenbach's novel posits a matriarchal family that supports multiculturalism and a classless society, but depends just as heavily on a problematic notion of "natural" self-sacrificing maternal roles. Even in Bo2ena. then, where the metaphor of family is used to further the admirable goal of cooperation among nations, the notion of "natural" roles, rather than individual choice, can lead to oppression.

230 Feminists have long argued that personal issues are

also political issues, and my study of these texts

demonstrates that linkage. This connection between family

and nation challenges the traditional notion that issues of

women's roles and family are "private" issues, with little

or no effect on "public" issues of politics and history, and

of only secondary value in literary studies. Literature

written by women before the twentieth century usually

focused on those "private" matters, and was ignored by

literary studies because such issues were not considered relevant to larger social and philosophical issues. Viewing

family issues as central to the organization of society and to the formation of national identity both provides another justification for the study of literature by women, and opens a new aspect in the study of the notion of national identity.

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