Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- A note on the translations
- Abbreviations
- Chronology of Kleist's life and works
- Dedication
- 1 Introduction
- I THE YOUNG KLEIST
- II VIRTUE ASSAILED
- III FICTIONS OF FEMININITY
- IV KLEIST AND THE NATIONAL QUESTION
- 8 Die Hermannsschlacht
- 9 Prinz Friedrich von Homburg
- 10 Conclusions
- Notes
- Select bibliography
- Index
8 - Die Hermannsschlacht
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 August 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- A note on the translations
- Abbreviations
- Chronology of Kleist's life and works
- Dedication
- 1 Introduction
- I THE YOUNG KLEIST
- II VIRTUE ASSAILED
- III FICTIONS OF FEMININITY
- IV KLEIST AND THE NATIONAL QUESTION
- 8 Die Hermannsschlacht
- 9 Prinz Friedrich von Homburg
- 10 Conclusions
- Notes
- Select bibliography
- Index
Summary
Given the negative tone of Kleist's earliest correspondence, his condemnation of the Prussian military hierarchy and his despair of ever finding a suitable position within the equally hierarchically-structured civil service, it might seem surprising that he should commit himself so whole-heartedly to the Prussian cause towards the end of his life. However, whilst Kleist was indeed critical of the conditions in his own country, it was Napoleonic France that he despised above all else. For it was in Paris that Kleist – like so many of his contemporaries – was confronted with the grotesque caricature of the ideals of his eighteenth-century upbringing. In his letter of 15 August 1801, we find him writing to Wilhelmine:
Zuweilen, wenn ich in die Bibliotheken ansehe, wo in prächtigen Sälen und in prächtigen Bänden die Werke Rousseaus, Helvetius', Voltaires stehen, so denke ich, was haben sie genutzt? Hat ein einziges seinen Zweck erreicht? Haben sie das Rad aufhalten können, das unaufhaltsam stürzend seinem Abgrund entgegeneilt?
(SW 11, 681)(Sometimes, when I see the libraries with their magnificent halls and all the works of Rousseau, Helvetius, and Voltaire that stand there, in magnificent bindings, I think to myself: of what use have they been? Has one of these works achieved its goal? Have they been able to slow the wheel that, plunging inexorably, speeds towards the abyss?)
[M, 123–4]Kleist readily conceded that the French were – at least from a technological point of view – more advanced than the Germans, but in his view this had simply produced a wholly corrupt and materialistically-oriented society, in which individual human beings were reduced to automata.
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- The Plays of Heinrich von KleistIdeals and Illusions, pp. 199 - 222Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1996