Inspiration Bonaparte?: German Culture and Napoleonic Occupation (Studies in German Literature Linguistics and Culture)
Seán Allan & Jeffrey L. High (Eds)
Camden House (September 15, 2021)
Hardcover: 328 pages
ISBN-13: 9781640140943
Two hundred years after his death, Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) continues to resonate as a fascinating, ambivalent, and polarizing figure. Differences of opinion as to whether Bonaparte should be viewed as the executor of the principles of the French Revolution or as the figure who was principally responsible for their corruption are as pronounced today as they were at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Contributing to what had been an uneasy German relationship with the French Revolution, the rise of Bonaparte was accompanied by a pattern of Franco-German hostilities that inspired both enthusiastic support and outraged dissent in the German-speaking states.
The fourteen essays that comprise Inspiration Bonaparte examine the mythologization of Napoleon in German literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and explore the significant impact of Napoleonic occupation on a broad range of fields including philosophy, painting, politics, the sciences, education, and film. As the contributions from leading scholars emphasize, the contradictory attitudes toward Bonaparte held by so many prominent German thinkers are a reflection of his enduring status as a figure through whom the trauma of shattered late-Enlightenment expectations of sociopolitical progress and evolving concepts of identity politics is mediated.
SEÁN ALLAN is Professor of German at the University of St Andrews. JEFFREY L. HIGH is Professor of German Studies at California State University, Long Beach.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I: Napoleon: Art, Literature, and Occupation
1: Prelude-Pre-Occupation Bonaparte:
Historical and Literary Conquerors in Schiller's Life, Thought, and Works
Jeffrey L. High
2: Schiller's Johanna and Collin's Bianca as Women('s)-Liberators in Anti-Napoleonic Drama
Rebecca Stewart
3: Friedrich Hölderlin, the French Revolution, and Napoleon: Politics, Poetry, Philosophy
Laura Anna Macor
4: The Anecdote on the Battlefield: Napoleon-Kleist-Kluge
Christian Moser
5: "Der große Schauspieler, Napoleon Buonaparte": August von Kotzebue's Antitheatrical Politics
Elystan Griffiths
6: An Ingenious Tyrant: The Representation of Napoleon Bonaparte by German Women Writers
Elisabeth Krimmer
7: Icons of Resistance: Kleist, Le Musée Napoléon, and Queen Luise of Prussia
Seán Allan
Part II: Napoleon: Political Science and Natural Science
8: The European Machine God: The Image of Napoleon Bonaparte in the Political Writings of Jean Paul
Helmut Schneider
9: Saul Ascher's Napoleon
Bernd Fischer
10: Napoleon's Campaigns: Models for "French" Revolutionary Science Abroad and at Home?
Mary Orr
11: Napoleonic Occupation and the Militarization of the Sciences:
The Case of Johannes Scherr and the Zurich Polytechnic
Andrew Cusack
Part III: Inspiration Bonaparte: German Receptions from Vormärz to the Present
12: "We are all possessed"! Napoleon and Inspiration in German Naturalist Drama
Michael White (University of St Andrews)
13: "Arnold Schoenberg's Setting of Byron's Ode to Napoleon: Fighting Hitler's Regime in Byron's and Beethoven's Wake
Wolf Kittler (University of California, Santa Barbara)
14: The Emperor's Clothes: Napoleon as a Screen Icon
Susanne Kord (University College London)
Notes on Contributors
something contemporary - the Hannoverian Vater unser - Lords prayer - to balance Heine, my free translation.
Stiefvater der du bist in Paris Stepfather who you are in Paris Vermaledeit sei dein Name Cursed is your name Dein Reich komme uns vom Hals Your reign should sod off Dein Wille geschehe weder im Himmel noch auf Erden Your will mustn't happen in heaven nor on earth Unser tägliches Brot raube uns nicht gänzlich Don't rob us completely our daily bread Verzeihe, daß wir dich nicht lieben, wie wir verzeihen, daß du ins nicht liebest Pardon us that we don't love you as we pardon you that you don't love us. Führe uns nicht in größeres Elend, sondern befreie uns von der Regie, den Douanan und allen Hungerleidern, Don't lead us into more misery but liberate us from regulations, customs and all starveling, Denn dein ist das Reich des Jammerns and Elends, Spott und Hohns, von nun an bis in alle Ewigkeit. Amen Yours is the rule of wailing and misery, mockery and scorn from now on till eternity. AmenThe Two Grenadiers by Heinrich Heine, 1822
Heinrich Heine: “The Two Grenadiers” 1822 | (poetsandprinces.com)
THE TWO GRENADIERSTo France were traveling two grenadiers,From prison in Russia returning,And when they came to the German frontiers,They hung down their heads in mourning.There came the heart-breaking news to their earsThat France was by fortune forsaken;Scattered and slain were her brave grenadiers,And Napoleon, Napoleon was taken.Then wept together those two grenadiersO'er their country's departed glory;"Woe's me," cried one, in the midst of his tears,"My old wound--how it burns at the story!"The other said: "The end has come,What avails any longer livingYet have I a wife and child at home,For an absent father grieving."Who cares for wife? Who cares for child?Dearer thoughts in my bosom awaken;Go beg, wife and child, when with hunger wild,For Napoleon, Napoleon is taken!"Oh, grant me, brother, my only prayer,When death my eyes is closing:Take me to France, and bury me there;In France be my ashes reposing."This cross of the Legion of Honor bright,Let it lie near my heart, upon me;Give me my musket in my hand,And gird my sabre on me."So will I lie, and arise no more,My watch like a sentinel keeping,Till I hear the cannon's thundering roar,And the squadrons above me sweeping."Then the Emperor comes! and his banners wave,With their eagles o'er him bending,And I will come forth, all in arms, from my grave,Napoleon, Napoleon attending!" What is the story behind the song The Two Grenadiers? - Answers