Little Ernest, Great Ernst: The Trials and Tribulations of E.T.A. Hoffmann in English, with especial reference to his Klein Zaches, genannt Zinnober*

*This is a slightly revised version of my Master’s dissertation (1998). There is still more work to be done, notably a passage on Odoevsky in the ‘Russia’ section.

CONTENTS

Introduction 1

The Critical Heritage: 4

Germany 4

Russia 6

France 9

The U.S.A. 12

Britain 14

Hoffmann In English Translation 24

Klein Zaches genannt Zinnober 32

Conclusion 42

Notes 48

Bibliography 51

Introduction

Poor Hoffmann. When his first literary text, Ritter Gluck, was published in the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung on 15 February 1809, the editor, Friedrich Rochlitz, made some alterations that the unhappy author had to accept. His greatest work, the Lebensansichten des Katers Murr, which consists of two intertwining narratives, was published as two separate strands in 1946, thereby nullifying the whole point of the novel; Murr is the philistine counter to the artist Kreisler, and the experiences of the one find their revealing reflection in the experiences of the other. And this is how he has suffered at the hands of his fellow countrymen – to say nothing of how he has fared in other countries, above all in England! Before 1948, there was no comprehensive account of his life and works in English[1]. Although he was “one of the most remarkable musical artists to have left his imprint on the Western tradition” and his review of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony has become “the critical benchmark to which all others must relate,”[2] being “probably the first real classic of music criticism”[3] and in continuous circulation since the time of its publication, no complete English translation of his musical writings appeared until 1989. Despite being the last nineteenth century German author of world-wide significance and influence, he is seldom included in world literature courses in schools and universities in England and America; he was not on the German Literature 1797-1848 course I studied at St. Andrews University in 1992, a course which inflicted the likes of Herodes und Mariamne and Heinrich von Ofterdingen on the groaning student; and his stature today is “perhaps greatest of all among students of Comparative Literature.”[4] When his name is associated with literature by the British public, they have a children’s fairy-tale in mind – by a man who could not write for children.

Few writers have provoked such a striking divergence of critical opinions. In this respect, Prinzessin Brambilla may be considered his most representative work; opinions expressed about it rate it as “one of the most baffling, most subtly intriguing, products of the creative imagination”[5] and consider it to be “the poetic expression for the betterment of mankind through the influence of the arts,”[6] whereas if I were to express my opinion, the terms used would be rather less complimentary and decidedly more Anglo-Saxon. And this is just one of many diverse texts. But this divergence at least represents an improved understanding from that of the last century, when there was a greater unity among those critics who passed comment; many of his writings were dismissed as the hallucinogenic visions of a lunatic or a drunkard. As a ‘character’ in Longfellow’s Hyperion remarks in the chapter that discusses Hoffmann: “he who drinks wine thinks wine.”[7] And as one critic memorably, if inaccurately, remarked: “The dreams of dyspeptic lunacy can go no further....”[8] In this century, he has been subjected to some interpretations that, if they had been written in his time and he had read them, would have made him fling away his pen in disgust at the poverty of his imagination and seek some new mode of artistic expression.

Yet this is the author who wrote arguably the greatest German novel of the 19^th century; who was one of the finest exponents of the ‘Kunstmärchen’; who wrote a ghost story of the first rank; who wrote one of the earliest detective stories; who introduced much that was new to fiction, including the automaton/robot; who was one of the first “urban masters”[9]; who was, arguably, the single most important factor in the popularisation of the short story and the development of this genre as an art-form: in short, one of the most talented, imaginative writers the world has seen.

Moreover, he was a talented composer, an able caricaturist, and a superb music critic. Yet multi-talented as he was – and there is occasionally a prejudice against those who possess talent in more than one field, a reluctance to recognise this ability, hence descriptions such as “the greatest dilettante of them all”[10] – it was in the realm of literature that he found his true means of expression. To suggest that it is fitting that his name should nowadays be associated primarily with opera (through the medium of Offenbach) because music was the major love of his life, or because opera is an art-form “perfectly suited to explore the recesses of the subconscious mind”[11] and more comfortable with the supernatural than literature, is to miss the point and misinterpret his writings. However, this area of his talent is not separate from the others; on the contrary, his texts evoke the theatre, the studio and the concert-hall.

The man has suffered from defamation of character, especially as a result of the biography written by his friend Hitzig in 1823, for so long the only source for his life in Britain, whether directly or via the media of Scott and Carlyle – but does that really explain the misunderstanding and the lack of appreciation that have been the lot of Hoffmann’s literary output in the English-speaking world? There were many unpleasant traits to the characters of Dickens and Goethe, yet their status as artists was not affected; with Byron, the myth did not only not harm the man, it was actually beneficial to his standing and reputation. It is the artist, not the personality, which forms the primary consideration: Hoffmann’s biographers tended to look for the fantastic in the man because they had seen it in his texts.

This dissertation will concentrate on the injustice that has been done to the author E.T.A. Hoffmann in the English-speaking world. Considering the humour that abounds in his work; bearing in mind that he wrote an excellent ghost story – a largely English genre – and a Gothic tale on the theme of the double, a theme that proved popular in these shores, finding its most popular expression through Robert Louis Stevenson and its greatest expression through James Hogg; taking account of the eccentric characters he occasionally creates (Kreisler and Krespel being the most memorable); and, above all, taking into consideration his irony, one would have thought that he had much to recommend him to an English audience. Reference will be made to a wider sphere to illustrate the contention that Hoffmann’s popularity or lack of popularity in a given land can often be explained by a misunderstanding of what he actually wrote, and to serve as a necessary basis for comparison; but English critics, and English translators, form the core of this work.

The first half contains three major sections: how Hoffmann has been translated by academics and writers; how he has been translated for the public; and a theoretical section describing the methodology behind the rendering of one of his best works given by this translator – a rendering that forms what we may, with a slightly ironic smile, call the greater half of this dissertation.

The Critical Heritage

Mention is often made of the enormous influence Hoffmann had on European literature. Names such as Heine, Hauff, Storm, Kafka, Mann, Balzac, Merimée, Musset, Nerval, Baudelaire, Flaubert, Dostoevski, Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Gorki, Dickens, Poe and Stevenson are reeled off, without any evidence being given to support the claim. This question of influence on writers and critics is the first to be considered; we will begin with his native land.

Germany

In a sense, this is the most important country as regards the reception of Hoffmann for this particular survey; it being the one where public and critics alike could have access to the original texts, and thus serving as a base for comparison with Russia, France and England, who were largely dependent on translations.

In his homeland, the omens were not good. Although the literary critic was the mouth-piece of the educated reading public in Hoffmann’s age, so that when the former praise a writer, “we may be sure that he is popular at least with a large section of the public” (and Hoffmann himself expressed his readiness in the capacity of critic to voice the public opinion[12]), yet his texts met with public enthusiasm and critical silence. So although, “In seiner Periode wurde er viel gelesen,” as Heine informs us[13], we may question the degree to which he was understood. Most of the leading literary contemporaries who survived him, and who believed in the moral and edifying purpose of literature, rejected him; and foremost among these figures was Goethe. When he does actually condescend to name Hoffmann, he groups him with authors such as Franz Horn and Clauren[14]. His recommendation of Scott’s essay – which will be dealt with later – did much to sully Hoffmann’s reputation in Germany throughout the rest of the century. Hegel was another prominent figure to launch an attack; considering that his doctrines emphasised the rational nature of reality and the progression of the human mind to knowledge of reality, it is understandable that the sheer uncertainty in Hoffmann’s texts met with disapproval from this philosopher. Like Kleist and Hölderlin before him, Hoffmann would have to wait a long time to be appreciated by the critics of his country.

His serious-minded colleagues were not in a position to appreciate his talent for satire and burlesque; this is reflected in the comments of Varnhagen von Ense, who claims that Hoffmann’s lack of “Gefühls-Innigkeit” soon lead to the novelty wearing off: “Auch der geistreichste Witz...verflüchtigt sich allzu bald.”[15] This lack of feeling, which amounted to a perceived inability to sufficiently love his fellow man, was a common criticism of Hoffmann[16]; yet this was the man who turned against Napoleon not from political considerations or nationalist zeal, but because of the enormous human misery he caused.

Moreover, their perception of literature was too limited to be able to appreciate him as a literary artist. Throughout most of the nineteenth century, Hoffmann was regarded in Germany as “a mere literary entertainer”[17]. The historian Heinrich von Treitschke, voicing a common opinion, recognises a “masterly story-teller” but considers that he suffers from an “over-wrought imagination”[18]. The fact that he, on the contrary, never loses sight of reality, and that this serves as an anchor in his works, is recognised by Heine, who uses the analogy of Antaeus. Indeed, Heine was one of the few critics with sufficient perception to appreciate what this author – a kindred spirit in certain respects – was doing; he may have criticised Meister Floh quite severely, but only “weil ich Hoffmann’s frühere Werke so sehr schätze und liebe.”[19]

There was a revival of interest in the 1870s, yet this was far from flattering; the reasons lay in a growing interest in the occult, in the romantic view of the artistic genius produced by sickness now being taken seriously, and in the pessimism inherent in the works of Wagner, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. There is a hoffmannesque influence vaguely discernible in these three artists – the sixteen-year-old Wagner, for example, was “on fire” with reading this author’s musical works, at a time when he was ignored in his homeland; the atheist Schopenhauer, who stood in such opposition to Hegel, would naturally be more of a kindred spirit; and Nietzsche, like Wagner, was attracted to Hoffmann’s works in his youth[20]. Yet, with a typical irony, by the time we reach the greatest German writer of the 20^th Century, who names these three artists as belonging to the first rank of those whose work has had a bearing on his, Hoffmann merely “spielt eine Rolle” along with the likes of Tieck, Schlegel and Novalis[21].

France

The first land to be visited is that in which Hoffmann enjoyed the greatest popularity. At first, Fate seemed to be frowning on him once again. Madame de Staël’s De l’Allemagne, which had first aroused French interest in Germany and German literature, had appeared in 1813, before Hoffmann had begun his literary career in earnest, and so he was not in a position to benefit from it. His first text to appear in France was – not surprisingly – Das Fräulein von Scuderi, albeit in a plagiarised form by Henri Delatouche. Then Die Elixiere des Teufels was printed – but it was attributed to Spindler, a popular German author at the time in France, in the hope of increasing sales. It was not until 1828, when a eulogistic article appeared in ‘Le Globe’, that France began to notice Hoffmann; from 1829 the ‘Revue de Paris’ began to publish his stories, and then, between 1830 and 1833, there appeared the translations by Loève-Veimars, which were the major factor behind his success on the Continent. The intended complete translation did not appear; but there were still 20 volumes of Hoffmann’s works available in French.

Here we see the importance of translation; yet there is occasionally a tremendous difference between Hoffmann’s text and the one that was presented to the French public. French translators sometimes concentrated on the actual story and then told it in their own way. For example, one (greatly abridged) translation of Klein Zaches begins in the following manner: “Au bord d’un champ de genêts fleuris, que baigne, en fuyant vers le nord, l’eau rêveuse du Rhin, près d’un village dont les toits épars s’enfoncent, comme des nids d’alouettes, sous des massifs de verdure embaumée....”[22] A most charming picture. Unfortunately, the translator has taken a wrong turning and ended up in the realm of rewriting. The short story generally known as Rat Krespel (it appears without a title in Die Serapionsbrüder) provides another interesting example of differing perceptions; it has also been called The Cremona Violin in England, Kreminskaya skripka when it appeared in Russia in 1830, and Antoine in France: so attention is diverted from the eccentric to his tragic daughter.

With many writers and critics, there is no thorough knowledge of Hoffmann to be discerned – merely a vague connection. Hence Baudelaire could describe an undeserving tale such as Chenevières’ Le Diable aux îles as worthy of Hoffmann, purely because the latter’s name was “a commonplace in discussions concerning the fantastic.”[23] Likewise, French critics could call Poe – a writer who has always, for some inexplicable reason, been hugely overrated – a “Hoffmann américain” and wheel out the trite old image: “les visions d’Hoffmann ne lui appartiennent pas, c’est lui qui leur appartient.”[24]

Yet it is more than possible that Baudelaire recognised the connection between colours, scents and sounds – his Fleurs du Mal contains some of the most fragrant poems ever written – from Hoffmann. While he does resort to the unwelcome metaphor of the German’s supernatural comic conceptions often resembling “à des visions de l’ivresse,”[25] he at least shows some understanding of the essential Hoffmann by discussing him in his essay De l’essence du rire. The attention he directs on Prinzessin Brambilla reflects one of the major reasons for Hoffmann’s popularity in France: his freedom of artistic expression, which was championed by the ‘l’art pour l’art’ movement, who wished to escape the constraints of middle-class piety and morality. The other major reason was his “exceptional psychological insight.”[26]

Hoffmann obviously exerted some influence on Nerval – himself a largely neglected writer – because the latter translated his Abenteuer der Sylvesternacht in 1831. There are few greater compliments that can be given an author than a translation of one of his texts; Carlyle’s introduction to his German Romance may be somewhat grudging in its praise (to say the least) but he nevertheless took the trouble to translate one of Hoffmann’s tales – and he possessed the judgement to select his finest story. A study of Nerval and his German heritage considers Hoffmann to be “the ultimate source of the fantastic element in Nerval’s stories,” but suggests that the differences between the two are just as important as the similarities.[27]

If we turn our attention to Balzac: “Les balzaciens ne s’accordent pas tout à fait sur l’importance d’Hoffmann pour Balzac”[28]. The French author certainly did not lend any encouragement to the suggestion that he was influenced by this author; and in his summary of Hoffmann’s reception in France, McGlathery has to fall back on the rather vague contention that an affinity between the two writers was suggested by their shared understanding and appreciation of Molière’s satirical genius. Yet although he criticises Hoffmann often, the mere fact that he does not ignore him must be taken into account; and although he stated, “Je ne me suis vraiment pas inspiré d’Hoffmann,”[29] he also claimed to have read all his works by November 1833. There is a grudging claim that Hoffmann capitalised on the taste for the fantastic that Nodier had created, even though the latter, with his classical tastes and insistence on purity of language, had little more in common with Hoffmann than a romantic temperament. In this case, professional jealousy is a real possibility.

The likes of Stendhal, Delacroix, de Musset and Merimée were the members of a society including Dr Koreff, a friend of Hoffmann who played a large part in publishing his works in France. Merimée was not alone when he expressed the opinion that when recounting the supernatural, one cannot have too many details of material reality – “That’s the great art of Hoffmann’s stories.”[30] And it is this “observation méticuleuse” that Theophile Gautier “admirait si vivement chez Hoffmann.”[31]

Gautier is the first author those studying Hoffmann’s reception in France should turn to. His article on the German author’s works, though little mentioned, is one of the most informative and sensible evaluations of Hoffmann, as well as being a lesson in concision: an ideal introduction. This article merits examination; the more salient points are as follows: asking why this author should be so popular in France of all nations, Gautier concludes that an erroneous image is responsible. This image is of Hoffmann the drunkard, Hoffmann the smoker, Hoffmann the diseased genius. So that which leads to his being ignored in England earns him popularity in France. (It is worthy of remark that, despite being so different from what literary France was used to, Hoffmann was nevertheless accepted; an example of a flexibility and a tolerance of innovation not to be found across La Manche). But the true cause for his success – that which earns him the title of artist – is his feeling for nature, his ability “to impart the appearance of reality to the most unlikely creations.”[32] This gift for observation finds its truest expression when describing physical peculiarities. The interplay of sounds, colours and feelings is an important factor in this creative power. Gautier, in direct contrast to Balzac, is reluctant to use the term fantastic, for Hoffmann gives the reader “the positive and plausible side of the fantastic”[33]; tales of fancy would be a more appropriate denomination. Finally, and unfortunately, the master has created a school of imitators who reproduce his fancies without his control, his art.

Yet Gautier’s was only one voice. Whereas an interest in Hoffmann’s texts was sufficiently widespread in France to justify the term ‘craze’, and there was a real demand for translations, a proper understanding of them was limited to a minority. A hundred years later, in 1931, Hoffmann’s name appeared on the ‘List of Forbidden Authors’ of the Paris bookseller José Corti – a centre of surrealism. So after having been condemned by Scott, Goethe and Hegel for his morbid, pathological, chaotic disorder, he was now rejected by the surrealists. No doubt he would have found the irony of the situation amusing.

Russia

It has been claimed that: “Of all German writers he was the most thoroughly known in Russia and exerted the most extensive influence there.”[34] Interest in Hoffmann began slowly in Russia, around the year 1822 – and so earlier than in any other foreign land, although some translations of his works had appeared in Scandinavian countries during his life.[35] The first translation to appear in Russia was of Das Fräulein von Scuderi; its classical French setting was no doubt considered likely to appeal to the reading public. There was a sharp increase in interest after 1829, around the time that the Loève-Veimars translations were making Hoffmann “the rage of Europe”[36]; this interest found expression in translations between 1829 and 1833, and then in imitations until around 1836, when it began to decline. Then, after 1840, and the equation of literature with political or polemical ends, Hoffmann, along with Romanticism, fell into disfavour.

Charles Passage has stated that the Hoffmann craze was created by the public at large, and not by the critics or the philosophers. Yet the German circle in Moscow – and it was Moscow from which the translations, on which the public relied, appeared – was, above all, a philosophical circle, in which Schelling and Hegel exerted a major influence. So it is not surprising that they admired Hoffmann for his “thought content” rather than his “merely literary value.”[37] However, judgements such as “a wonderful mighty genius”[38] – made by Belinsky as late as 1840 – attest to a more than philosophical warmth. The selective nature of their knowledge must also be taken into consideration; a complete translation of his works into Russian did not appear until the end of the nineteenth century. Of course, the variable quality of his writing means that, on the one hand, a complete collection could be more damaging to his reputation than a selection; on the other hand, it is necessary to illustrate his range, for although certain themes recur throughout his work, the treatment of these themes differs greatly. Moreover, the nature of the selection must be considered. In general, his ‘gloomier’ works aroused more interest than his humorous ones – for example, Die Elixiere des Teufels, Der Magnetiseur and Der Sandmann. The humorous longer Märchen had very little impact, and texts of the quality of “Don Juan” and “Ritter Glück” were ignored. Because of this eclectic judgement, there was “a very broad misconception of the man and his works” which missed “his essential joy.”[39]

Of the Russian authors named in the previous list we may discount Turgenev, for want of evidence (Hoffmann is an author he simply does not mention, nor do his works lead us to suppose that he would; there are certain vague analogies, but they remind one of Greek art sooner than German Romanticism), and Gorki. The latter had read Hoffmann[40], but does not mention him among the numerous influential authors in his How I Learnt to Write. His letters contain only a disparaging reference to Gogol’s imitations of Hoffmann[41].

As concerns Pushkin, who was unfamiliar with German literature in general, one critic has detected “a typological affinity” between Don Juan and the Russian Master’s late stories[42]; the case is, however, not proven. While Hoffmann sits back and listens to one of the most glorious of all operas, the reader sits back and listens to the grating sound of a barrel being scraped. Pushkin almost certainly did read some of Hoffmann’s work – for example, his library contained the French translation of Die Elixiere des Teufels attributed to Spindler – but the tenuous connection between the two is generally based on a perceived link between Spielerglück and The Queen of Spades. This may be so; we learn that, “According to a contemporary, Pushkin was very much interested in Hoffmann around the time he worked on ‘Pikovaia dama.’”[43] But there is nothing in Pushkin’s later work, or letters, or writings on literature, to suggest that this interest lasted; and this particular tale has always been considered the ‘odd one out’ of his stories. It has even been claimed that it was a parody of Hoffmann’s ‘diabolic’ tales.[44] He began to write The Lonely Cottage on Vasilevski Island, which has been linked to Hoffmann’s posthumous Datura fastuosa – but then abandoned it for another writer to complete.

Passage draws a clear distinction between Dostoevski and the so-called other Russian Hoffmannists: “His method of procedure...was a multiplication, not a division.... They imitated, he created”.[45] This charge of imitation was aimed at, among others, Gogol, whose first story about an artist (The Portrait) was criticised by the leading critic Belinsky for “being too derivative of E.T.A. Hoffmann”[46], and who later wrote The Nose, which is closer to being a parody of Hoffmann. There is a sense that this was a passing influence for Gogol; he writes that reading this author gave him a “notion of a wondrous and fantastic Germany,” which “vanished when I saw Germany in fact.”[47] But attempts to link him with Hoffmann are, in general, so tentative – there seems to be a much stronger case for citing the influence of Tieck – that there is no point in pursuing the question of whether his knowledge of German was really as imperfect as was formerly claimed. His greatness lies in his uniqueness and originality; in his being himself.

With Dostoevski there is a strong case for Hoffmann’s influence. In 1838, he claimed to have read all of the German author’s works; in his preface to Three Tales of Edgar Poe in ‘Time’ Magazine, January 1861, he not only praised the American, but also wrote that, as an artist, “Hoffmann is immeasurably greater than Poe.”[48] This influence is evident in Dostoevski’s work; there are so many parallels to be drawn that they cannot be ascribed to mere coincidence. Moreover, it was no passing phase, as had been the case with other Russian writers, but lasted, in varying form, for most of his life. He possessed the insight to recognise Kater Murr as Hoffmann’s best production; for once, we have an artistic genius, whose judgement can be relied on, giving him the credit he deserves. Yet his knowledge, we may safely assume, derived largely from translations; his remark in a letter to his brother Mikhail that he had read all of Hoffmann in Russian and German – that is, Kater Murr, which had not yet been translated[49] – apart from indicating his (impatient) enthusiam for this author, suggests that he would prefer to read the latter’s works in translation, if at all possible. And it is worth making the point that greatness can be recognised even in a bad translation; for example, the translation of Mickiewicz’s Forefathers by Count Potocki of Montalk[50] may have caused the occasional cringe and squirm, but the quality of the original was still somehow evident (in places). Likewise, with Hoffmann, not even Kent and Knight – who produced the worst translations of his work into English I have encountered – are able to totally extinguish the spark of greatness. This is extremely difficult to do.

The U.S.A.

The name of Poe has been especially associated with Hoffmann. The American has been given the credit and paid the critical attention that are due to the German, even though it does not take a trained eye to observe that Hoffmann’s “structural intricacy and moderated horror are seldom to be seen in Poe’s work.”[51] Yet there is no evidence for influence here, merely some affinities, and just as many differences. The fact that he never mentioned Hoffmann’s name is not overly important in this case, for Poe tended to treat those from whom he borrowed with silence or harsh criticism; but Poe’s inability to either speak or read German is of greater import. What may at first appear to provide a direct link must be considered against the available evidence; for example, his use of the ‘Doppelgänger’ theme in William Wilson was a borrowing from Washington Irving’s An Unwritten Drama of Lord Byron, not from Die Elixiere des Teufels. He merely knew the plot summaries and biographical details provided by Scott, Carlyle and Longfellow, on which he appears to have based the character of Roderick Usher.[52] Despite this, there are courses in Comparative Literature such as ‘Uncanny Stories: Poe and Hoffmann’; of course, a writer does not have to have had a direct influence on another writer to make comparison between the two possible or profitable. However, linking Hoffmann’s name with Poe’s not only degrades the former’s literary style, but also directs attention towards that aspect of his work that has already been accorded too much notice. But those Germanists who attempted to establish the link at the beginning of the twentieth century probably meant well; they cannot be blamed for their eagerness to gain some belated recognition for Hoffmann by citing him as a major influence on a famous writer. Their efforts, though inaccurate, at least brought attention to Hoffmann’s name. Hoffmann lacks the status of a Goethe or a Pushkin, and his belonging to a non-Anglo-American culture means that he is most likely to be studied in the English-speaking World is in a Comparative Literature course. If we are going to compare him with an American author, then why not select Nathaniel Hawthorne, for whom the case for an influence is even more negligible, but who is a similarly under-rated writer?

The earliest translations in the U.S.A. were The Lost Reflection (Die Geschichte vom verlornen Spiegelbilde), translated anonymously and published in 1826 in the [Boston] Athenaeum; Holcraft's translation of Das Fräulein von Scuderi, published in ‘Tales of Humour and Romance’ in New York and Baltimore in 1829, and Gluck (Ritter Gluck) in the [Boston] American Monthly Magazine in 1830. After that, the occasional single translation would appear from time to time, such as that of Spielerglück in the Washington ‘Democratic Review’ (XVI) in 1845.[53] A table of the most reviewed/translated German authors in the United States for the period 1810-64 places Hoffmann in joint 23^rd place with Hauff and Lavater. 15 articles were written on him, as opposed to 80 on Körner, 101 on Jean Paul, and 379 on Goethe. In this same period there were eight British and American translations of his texts; this rose to 22 between 1865 and 1899, giving a total of 30 as opposed to a total of 77 for Zschokke and 109 for Fouqué. The rise is attributable to the growing interest in Nußknacher und Mausekönig as the modern Christmas began to take shape, and to the aforementioned arousal of interest in the occult. But the number is still low; in the Age of the Sentimental Novel, one can easily imagine that Hoffmann was not likely to appeal to the American public. Moreover, it has been claimed that Heine’s criticism played an important part in shaping the American view of German literary history; becoming popular through his lucid and concise style, he halted interest in Tieck, Novalis and Hoffmann[54]. This could refer to the perception of the criticism rather than the criticism itself; when Heine was critical, he was often so with a slight irony, and the famous image he has left of Hoffmann’s work being a cry of anguish in twenty volumes has perhaps been taken too seriously. It should not be forgotten that he writes, in Die Harzreise (1826) of “Der selige Hoffmann.”[55]

The most popular tales in America, with the exception of the ubiquitous Nußknacker, include Meister Martin, Rat Krespel and Die Fermate. There seems to be a definite inclination towards the musical, the historical, and the comical; the ironical, as one would expect, has met with little appreciation.

Britain

There has always been a general ignorance towards German literature in England. This is partly owing to its content, which like the noun-heavy language can seem overly abstract to the dull English mind – “The parent vice of German literature is want of distinct purpose,” and its subject matter is dismissed as “idle speculation”[56] – and partly owing to a prejudice against the German language. Around Hoffmann’s time, German literature “was generally regarded by English critics...as crude and vulgar.”[57] Common opinion sees it as a harsh, unlovely language; those who have read the poetry of Eichendorff and Mörike would beg to differ. Many people do not seem to realise that English produces much of its greatest poetry when it is pithy, forceful and direct; in other words, when it approaches the Germanic languages rather than the prolix languages of the Romance world. Hoffmann paid the price of his nationality – “Sober, practical England, where visionaries have no chance of toleration, regarded him as an author who heaped extravagance upon extravagance, without a thought of aim or purport”[58] – but without being a particularly German author. Indeed, as Gautier said in his previously discussed article, the cloudier and dreamier Germans preferred Novalis.

The first of Hoffmann’s texts to be translated into English was, unsurprisingly, Die Elixiere des Teufels. [59] Just as Das Fräulein von Scuderi suited the tastes of the Russian and French public, so this novel was considered to be of interest to a public with a taste for Gothic horror. The year of the translation – 1824 – saw the publication of James Hogg’s Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, which also treated the ‘Doppelgänger’ theme. There may be, at first sight, a link with Robert Louis Stevenson; but Hoffmann is an author he neither analyses nor mentions, whereas this text of Hogg’s had always “haunted and puzzled”[60] him.

With a confidence unwarranted by available evidence, Una Pope-Hennessy claims that Dickens “had certainly read Hoffmann’s ‘Tales’”, and in support of this contention she mentions his friend Carlyle always talking about German literature and the common theme, shared by Der Goldne Topf and A Christmas Carol, of a door-knocker transforming into a face[61]. It is true that Dickens’ Christmas Books remind one of Nußknacker und Mausekönig and Meister Floh; but it is still “not easy to establish any direct connections between Dickens and German Romanticism.”[62] All we can say is that Hoffmann anticipated Dickens in this respect, as he anticipated so many authors in so many fields, and that, ironically, it was Dickens’ popularisation of Christmas that gave Hoffmann his greatest success in England.

If we attempt to present a cogent argument for influence on any British writers during this period, the name most likely to be forwarded is that of George Meredith; likewise, the name of William Gilmore Simms would represent the U.S.A. The mere fact that such minor names are mentioned is instructive; there were numerous minor authors in France and Russia who undoubtedly borrowed extensively from Hoffmann, but there has been no need to discuss them in this paper because of the number of major writers who had been mentioned in connection with the German author. But in the Anglo-American world, one really has to look hard.

Before moving on to the British critics and public, we must pause to elucidate a certain fact. It is not the existence of Hoffmann’s influence that has been called into question; it is rather the nature of this influence, and the reason why his name was invoked. The fact that he was mentioned and his influence stated whenever an author wrote a text that contained a ‘supernatural’ element is, in a way, a compliment; it suggests that he was the master of a particular genre. However, this is a genre that has seldom been taken seriously – despite the fact that the likes of M.R. James and Sheridan Le Fanu write in an excellent style, which can seldom be claimed for those who indulge in other ‘patronised’ genres such as fantasy and science fiction – and it only forms one aspect of Hoffmann’s literary output. His use of the supernatural was, indeed, considered to be detrimental to his serious intentions.

In England, as in Germany during the nineteenth century, he fell victim to the prudery of critics and public. This tendency was also evident in the first translations of Hoffman into English, by Gillies in 1824 and then in 1826 (when he chose the ‘edifying’ Das Fräulein von Scuderi and Das Majorat). He wrote that German authors needed to be subjected to a slight reworking to make them more acceptable to the British public. Nor was this squeamishness unique to that age; a hundred years later, we find such a harmless phrase as “sei es ihm bald geworden, als sprängen alle Adern in seine Brust, und er müsse sich verbluten,” from Die Bergwerke zu Falun, being translated as “he felt as though his heart must break.”[63] But Gillies’ translations were, in general, warmly received; for example, George Borrow wrote that although Die Elixiere des Teufels was “undoubtedly revolting in parts,” it nevertheless contained as much “fanciful beauty and absorbing interest”[64] as any German text since Faust: prudery, but praise as well. The balance between the two was about to shift dramatically.

Sir Walter Scott had the major influence on Hoffmann’s reception in England – and, through Goethe’s warm recommendation of this essay, in Germany – in the nineteenth century. His essay On the Supernatural in Fictitious Composition; and particularly on the Works of Ernest Theodore Amadeus Hoffmann, which appeared in the ‘Foreign Quarterly Review’, I, 1 (July) 1827, is not as harsh a critique as has sometimes been claimed; he does mention “the immoderate use of opium,”[65] wine, tobacco, and a state close to insanity, but he also recognises Hoffmann’s “turn for remark and powerful description.”[66] Like Carlyle, he had read this author in his native language; like Carlyle, he recognised this author’s literary ability: it is a perceived misapplication of talent that he, like Carlyle, is criticising. For Scott, the ‘fantastic’ could only be justified by having a moral purpose – he cites Frankenstein and Gulliver’s Travels as examples – and if this morality is lacking then it merely exists to shock. However, this is a false criterion to apply to the judgement of Hoffmann’s tales; they have no moral message, they lead to no edifying ending. Indeed, the ending of his stories is of little importance; what matters is the telling of the tale. The strife, the agitation, the irreconcilable conflict perceived to run throughout Hoffmann’s work was as repugnant to the British as it was attractive to the Russians.

It is amazing to consider just how influential Scott’s essay was, even though he discusses only one of Hoffmann’s texts – Das Majorat – in any real depth.[67] He really was not sufficiently acquainted with this author to comment on his work. His translation of passages from Das Majorat also differs from the original in certain respects, such as the description of the castle of R-sitten; like Gillies, we have the Victorian notion of the translator as editor of the text.

Scott’s was a general ignorance; it led Blackwood’s Magazine to describe Hoffmann’s work as the most popular of the “light reading”[68] from Germany. It is also evident in Carlyle, despite his enthusiasm for German literature: he mentions “the wild anarchy, musical and moral, said to reign”[69] (my italics) in the first two volumes of Kater Murr. And in a comment which brings home to us with sickening force the literary taste of those times, he finds Meister Martin der Küfner und seine Gesellen noted by the critics as being Hoffmann’s best work, for it is written in a style “which even reminds us of the Author of Waverley.”[70] In Russia and France Hoffmann’s ‘philosophy’ and reality respectively had attracted attention and veneration. In Britain, the supposed philosophy deterred readers and the reality was not perceived. His popular image, which aroused interest in the first two nations, excited scornful contempt in the third. And there was not even one leading British writer to champion – directly or indirectly – his cause. His texts were seldom translated into English after 1826; there simply was not the demand. After 1830, he was hardly ever mentioned in the leading English journals; he was considered to be an author of excess, who would appeal only to a minority. It was – and irony seems to plague Hoffmann through life and death – an appalling example of literary analysis, Freud’s essay on Das Unheimliche, which instigated a revival of interest; the same story which led to Scott’s harshest criticism – Der Sandmann – now began the Hoffmann rehabilitation. Three years later, a number of articles appeared in England to commemorate the centenary of his death; and the following year a first collection of his tales, many of which had never been translated before, was presented to the English-speaking world by J.T. Bealby.

The short story writer often finds himself prone to inaccurate evaluation; for example, one of the greatest