Reviews and Comments

this one needs a big warning because of it's antisemitic and racist stories (and you have to add the casual mentioning of pedophiliac acts)! mind you there a eleven stories and most of them are no more than what you might expect from a writer in the first years of the twentieth century (although the edition is from 1922, the stories were written before the great war). but two of them are far worse then the zeitgeist might had demanded.

die tomatensauce (the tomato sauce): sadly enough it's nothing about creepy spice but blood lust, surprisingly gory die herzen der könige (the hearts of the kings): lengthy story about how the french kings literally added to arts das weiße mädchen (the white girl): i would say a decadent (in the Huysman-sense) tableau about lust, but with less art (than huysman) das feenland (the land of faeries): the same, but about innocence. both stories are depending on a kind of twist in the end die herren juristen (those jurists): an emotional piece against death sentence die wasserleiche (the body of a drowned): a kind of satire -- i think John Hamilton Llewelles ende (The end of John Hamilton Llewelles): in my opinion one of the best in the collection. an artist falls prey to an natural mummy. several elements make this one (for the sake of our times) a proto-lovecraftian story. aus dem tagebuch eines orangenbaumes (from the diary of an orange tree): nice executed version of the circe myth der tote jude (the dead jew): it's the antisemitic one of course, at the core a ghost story in a unbelievable rough fraternity setting die topharbraut (the bride of the tophar): a very nice gothic story die mamaloi (the mamaloi): a racist voodoo story, very brutal

an odd mixture in quality

i just finished these 900 pages and here is the first impression: it is a really well written work of historical ficton, but... it combines thought provocing questions of state, religion, responsibility, but... from a modern view it falls every time on the wrong side.

the meaning of building up a true faithful and ever so benign monarch in Friedrich Wilhelm II collides with the events, which from time to time are barely held back from attacking this picture.

how to solve this? it's a weakness of the text that a great part of the pages are lamenting about the ill understood intentions of the king and talking about the pain this induces to him. but the reader seldom learns about this events, they're more often shadwos of the king's thoughts and feelings.

it is still an interesting read. the style is really fine and it's an accomplishment to write a gripping novel you want all the time to contradict.