The Invisible Lodge

Die unsichtbare Loge #1-2

by Jean Paul Friedrich Richter

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Genres: German Literature, Fiction

Kindle Edition

Published January 1, 2011

About the author

Humorous and sentimental novels of German writer Jean Paul Friedrich Richter under pen name Jean Paul include Titan (1800-1803) and Years of Indiscretion (1804-1805).

In the Fichtelgebirge mountains of Bavaria, his father worked as an organist. This fathre served in 1765 as a pastor at Joditz near Hof and in 1767 at Schwarzenbach but died on 25 April 1779, leaving the family in great poverty. After attending the gymnasium at Hof, Jean Paul went in 1781 to the University of Leipzig. His original intention was to enter his father's profession, but theology did not interest him, and he soon devoted himself wholly to the study of literature. Unable to maintain himself at Leipzig, he returned in 1784 to Hof, where he lived with his mother. From 1787 to 1789 he served as a tutor at Töpen, a village near Hof; and from 1790 to 1794 he taught the children of several families in a school he had founded in nearby Schwarzenbach.
Jean Paul began his career as a man of letters with Grönländische Prozesse ("Greenland Lawsuits", published anonymously in Berlin) and Auswahl aus des Teufels Papieren ("Selections from the Devil's Papers", signed J. P. F. Hasus), the former of which was issued in 1783-84, the latter in 1789. These works were not received with much favour, and in later life Richter himself had little sympathy for their satirical tone. A spiritual crisis he suffered on 15 November 1790, in which he had a vision of his own death, altered his outlook profoundly. His next book, Die unsichtbare Loge ("The Invisible Lodge"), a romance published in 1793 under the pen-name Jean Paul (in honour of Jean Jacques Rousseau), had all the qualities that were soon to make him famous, and its power was immediately recognized by some of the best critics of the day.
Encouraged by the reception of Die unsichtbare Loge, Richter composed a number of books in rapid succession: Hesperus (1795), Biographische Belustigungen unter der Gehirnschale einer Riesin (1796), Leben des Quintus Fixlein (1796), Der Jubelsenior (1797), and Das Kampaner Tal (1797). Also among these was the novel Blumen- Frucht- und Dornenstücke, oder Ehestand, Tod und Hochzeit des Armenadvokaten Siebenkäs in 1796-97. The book's slightly supernatural theme, involving a Doppelgänger and pseudocide, stirred some controversy over its interpretation of the Resurrection, but these criticisms served only to draw awareness to the author. This series of writings assured Richter a place in German literature, and during the rest of his life every work he produced was welcomed by a wide circle of admirers.
After his mother's death in 1797, Richter went to Leipzig, and in the following year to Weimar, where he started work on his most ambitious novel, Titan, published between 1801-02. Richter became friends with such Weimar notables as Herder, by whom he was warmly appreciated, but despite their close proximity, Richter never become close to Goethe and Schiller, both of whom found his literary methods repugnant; but in Weimar, as elsewhere, his remarkable conversational powers and his genial manners made him a favorite in general society. In 1801 he married Caroline Meyer, whom he had met in Berlin the year before. They lived first at Meiningen, then at Coburg; and finally, in 1804, they settled at Bayreuth.
Here Richter spent a quiet, simple and happy life, constantly occupied with his work as a writer. In 1808 he was fortunately delivered from anxiety about outward necessities by Prince Primate Karl Theodor von Dalberg, who gave him a pension. Titan was followed by Flegeljahre (1804-5), two works which he himself regarded as his masterpieces. His later imaginative works were Dr Katzenbergers Badereise (1809), Des Feldpredigers Schmelzle Reise nach Flätz (1809), Leben Fibels (1812), and Der Komet, oder Nikolaus Marggraf (1820-22). In Vorschule der Aesthetik (1804) he expounded his ideas on art; he discussed the principles of education i

Reviews

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

REVIEWER'S PREFACE

This was the first real book by Johann Paul Friedrich Richter, who called himself Jean Paul out of admiration for Jean-Jacques Rousseau, for me, after his rather short Selflifedescription and his grammatical expedition into the deep waters of German compound words. Reading the latter one was actually triggered by The Invisible Lodge because of his rather unusual (read incorrect) way of building those words. Reading the book at hand, on the other hand, was triggered by Dein Name (Your Name) by German/Iranian scholar and writer Navid Kermani who made some strong references to Jean Paul's books in general and particularly to this one. I would go so far as to say that Dein Name is in parts a modern variation of “The Lodge”.

Before I forget it and to make a digression (a plot device which Jean Paul was apparently a master of): There is no Lodge in The Invisible Lodge. Or at least I didn't find one. Maybe it's there, maybe not. Maybe it is indeed invisible (end of digression).

Jean Paul lived from 1763 to 1825, so he somehow bridged the late German Classicism to early Romanticism. This was his first novel, and he wrote it when he was only 28 years old (first published in 1793).

FIRST SECTION – IN WHICH THE PLOT IS EXPLAINED

Giving the plot of this novel is somewhat useless, because there is no real plot. Anyway, the main protagonist, the hero, as Jean Paul calls him, is Gustav, and the book is supposed to be Gustav's life description. But Gustav doesn't appear before the third section (this is what the chapters are called in the book) in which the author introduces Gustav like this:

Sei gegrüßet, kleiner Schöner, auf dem Schauplatze dieses Lumpenpapiers und dieses Lumpenlebens! Ich weiß dein ganzes Leben voraus, darum beweget mich die klagende Stimme deiner ersten Minute so sehr; ich sehe an so manchen Jahren deines Lebens Tränentropfen stehen, darum erbarmet mich dein Auge so sehr, das noch trocken ist, weil dich bloß dein Körper schmerzet – ohne Lächeln kommt der Mensch, ohne Lächeln geht er, drei fliegende Minuten lang war er froh.

My greeting to thee, little darling! here on the scene of this rag-paper and this ragged life! I know thy whole life beforehand, therefore it is that the wailing voice of thy first minute moves me so sorely: I see on so many a year of thy life tear-drops hanging, that is why I am so touched with compassion, as I look at thy eye, which is as yet tearless because it is merely thy body that pains thee;--man comes without a smile, without a smile he goes, for a space of three fleeting minutes he was happy.

I took this and all the other quoteѕ from the German version that I read, and from the English translation made by Charles T. Brooks which is available on Project Gutenberg. Unfortunately the English version is incomplete. It misses three(!) kind of forewords and an afterword written by Jean Paul plus the text Contented Little Schoolmaster, Wutz, which is called an “idyl” by the author, and which he added to the end of The Invisible Lodge, probably to give his novel a somewhat more positive ending; schoolmaster Wutz being a minor character of the book.

ЅECOND SECTION – IN WHICH THE ALMIGHTY AUTHOR APPEARS, BECOMES A CHARACTER, AND TURNS THE BOOK INTO A META-BOOK

As you can see from the quote above, Jean Paul, the *I*, plays an active role in his own book, making this some kind of meta-novel. This is basically going on for the whole duration of the story. Time and again, the author leaves the current context, jumps into his study room, and describes to the reader what he is actually doing (writing a section for instance), and why, before continuing with his story.

Jean Paul decides to become a character in his own narrative, namely the instructor of Gustav, when he says:

Man muß nicht denken, daß ich Informator geworden, um Lebensbeschreiber zu werden, d.h. um pfiffigerweise in meinen Gustav alles hineinzuerziehen, was ich aus ihm wieder ins Buch herauszuschreiben trachtete; denn ich brauchte es erstlich ja nur wie ein Romanen-Manufakturist mir bloß zu ersinnen und andern vorzulügen; aber zweitens wurde damals an eine Lebensbeschreibung gar nicht gedacht.

It must not be thought that I got myself made an instructor in order to be a biographer, i. e., in order craftily to educate into my Gustavus all that I afterward wanted to write out of him into a book; for, in the first place, I, surely, as a romance-manufacturer, needed merely to imagine myself such, and impose the fiction upon others; but, secondly, at that time a biography had not been thought of.

As I understand it, Jean Paul makes up the reason for making up anything, because it's a novel, but doesn't have to, because he experienced it without ever thinking about a novel. How's that for a post-modernistic approach? At least one character (Gustav's father) ovisouly thinks so too when he proclaims:

Bei meiner Seele! so etwas sollte man drucken lassen

Upon my soul, such a thing ought to be printed!

To which the author, Jean Paul, or the one who is called Jean Paul by Jean Paul, I don't know which, replies:

Und wahrhaftig, hier lässet man es ja drucken.

And in fact it is printed here.

So Jean Paul knows exactly what he is doing. He is in control and holds the reins. Of course, this is true for any author of any novel, but Jean Paul actually tells the readers about this, and thereby loosen the reins somewhat, when he decides at one point that the time the story is set has become the same time the story is progressing, and he actually likes it when he says:

[...] ich danke dem Himmel, daß ich jetzt niemals mehr weiß, als ich eben berichte: anstatt daß ich bisher immer mehr wußte und mir den biographischen Genuß der freudigsten Szenen durch die Kenntnis der traurigen Zukunft versalzt. So aber könnt' in der nächsten Viertelstunde uns alle das Weltmeer ersäufen: in der jetzigen lächelten wir in dasselbe hinein.

[...] I thank heaven that I have now overtaken, with my biographical pen, the actual course of things, and that no one knows more than I report; whereas heretofore I always knew more, and embittered for myself the biographical enjoyment of the happiest scenes by the knowledge of the most mournful. But now, though in the next quarter of an hour the sea might swallow us all up, in the present one we looked out on it with a smile.

Another quote I would like to add but don't find the right context for, so I just put it here, is this:

Ich will es nur heraussagen, daß ich selber der Pate und diese neue Person bin; aber es wird meiner Bescheidenheit mehr zustatten kommen, wenn ich mich in einem Sektor, wo ich so viel zu meinem Lobe vorbringen muß, aus der ersten Person in die dritte umsetze und bloß sage Pate, nicht ich.

I will just say it out at once, that I myself am this godfather and this new personage; but it will stand my modesty in better stead, if, in a section where I must needs bring forward so much in my own praise, I transpose myself out of the first person into the third, and say merely godfather, not I.

THIRD AND FOURTH SECTION – IN WHICH THE PROSE AND STYLE IS EXAMINED BRIEFLY

As you can see from the quotes above the prose is rather sophisticated. There are usually very long sentences, and I admit I had some hard time figuring out the meaning of quite a few of those. But once this has been done, and the meaning becomes clear, I realize how beautiful the language of Jean Paul really is! One thing that's odd about this book is the fact that it was actually a little easier for me to get the English translation–at least the parts I read– than the German original (being a native German myself). This is because the vocabulary used by Jean Paul contains a lot of German words that I'm not familiar with. Even the standard German dictionary (Duden) wasn't of any help in many cases. I think I have to read the book a second time, marking all the unknown words, and do some deeper research about their meanings.

Apart from these “obstacles” I have to say that I seldom read prose this witty (one one hand) and poignant (on the other). The best adjective (in German) to describe the kind of wittiness I found here that I can think of would be ulkig, but I don't know how to translate this word properly. Even the romantic/sentimental/passionate parts found in this book aren't as unnerving as they usually are for me. And, yes, I even shed a tear or three!

FINAL SECTION – IN WHICH WE HAVE TO REALIZE THAT THIS BOOK AS WELL AS ANYTHING ELSE IN LIFE IS INCOMPLETE

The Invisible Lodge contains two parts (plus the “idyl” of schoolmaster Wutz). But Jean Paul meant to write three parts in the first place. He never got around to writing the third part though, because at the time he would rather like to start a new novel. You might say that this is too bad, and that the reader is deprived of something, maybe even something important? Well, I don't think so. The novel, as it is, has some kind of closure and for me the unfinished ending is just right.
And Jean Paul wouldn't be him if he wouldn't provide some explanation for his decision to abandon the project of his first novel:

Welches Leben in der Welt sehen wir denn nicht unterbrochen? Und wenn wir uns beklagen, daß ein unvollendet gebliebener Roman uns gar nicht berichtet, was aus Kunzens zweiter Liebschaft und Elsens Verzweiflung darüber geworden, und wie sich Hans aus den Klauen des Landrichters und Faust aus den Klauen des Mephistopheles gerettet hat – so tröste man sich damit, daß der Mensch rund herum in seiner Gegenwart nichts sieht als Knoten, – und erst hinter seinem Grabe liegen die Auflösungen; – und die ganze Weltgeschichte ist ihm ein unvollendeter Roman.

What life in the world do we see that is not interrupted and incomplete? And if we complain that a Romance is left unfinished--that it does not even inform us what came of Kunz's second courtship and Elsie's despair on the occasion--how Hans escaped the claws of the sheriff, and Faust those of Mephistopheles--still let us console ourselves with the reflection that man, in his present existence, sees nothing on any side but knots, that only beyond his grave lie the solutions, and that all History is to him an unfinished Romance.

REVIEWER'S POSTFACE

Reading this book (and the other two I mentioned in the preface above) has made Jean Paul my favorite German writer of the 18th/19th century and the great thing is that–at least in this case– the best things in life are free. I bought a Kindle version of Jean Paul's complete works (that contains all of his novels and a lot of other writings, but is not entirely complete) from a bookseller named after a large South American river for less than an Euro. So there will be hundreds of hours of reading pleasure for me ahead.

And since the copyright (if there ever was such a thing) has long been expired, there are quite a few of Jean Paul's works available for free on the net:

here [in German]
& here [also in German]
& here [in German and English]

LAST WORDS

If you don't believe me when I tell you how great Jean Paul is, maybe you believe Arno Schmidt who had to say this about Jean Paul:

[Jean Paul ist] einer unserer Großen [...], einer von den Zwanzig, für die ich mich mit der ganzen Welt prügeln würde.

[Jean Paul is] one of our greatest [...], one of the twenty for which I would fight with the whole world.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

[Hendrik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Der unsichtbaren Loge fehlt der Schlussband, man wird also nie mehr erfahren, was aus dem Helden geworden ist. Macht aber nichts. Das Beste sind sowieso die Kommentare des Autors, der sich dauernd in seine von ihm verfasste Lebensbeschreibung, denn es ist kein Roman, (darauf legt er großen Wert!) einschaltet. Gewitzt und mit einer grundlegenden Güte versehen, betrachtet er das Treiben der Kleinen und Großen auf dieser Welt. Die Sprache ist nicht ganz leicht zu lesen, aber unbedingt aller Mühe wert.

[Yve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, I can certainly see how Jean Paul inspired Robert Schumann—his writing is full of sudden, extreme, and almost nonsensical mood shifts, winding passages and truncated sidenotes… I mean this all in the most complimentary way, of course.

At the most simple, The Invisible Lodge is intended as a “biography” of Gustavus, who Jean Paul follows from before his conception (his father winning his mother’s hand in a carefully rigged game of chess), through his childhood (kept, at his grandparents’ behest, for his early years in a sealed underground chamber with only a tutor and a dog for company), and young adulthood (where he enters Scheerau, joins the army, and falls in love). But, thanks to the dozens of characters in Scheerau and their hundreds of dramas and permutations, Gustavus’s life story is afforded myriad diversions and any sense of plot that there might have been at the beginning is quickly confounded.

Furthermore, the narrator Jean Paul emerges as one of the most forceful characters of the retinue. Now, I’ve tried looking on the internet but I can’t find sufficient biographical information on Jean Paul to determine how much of The Invisible Lodge is taken from his life, so for the sake of clarity (if that can ever be achieved), I will conflate author and narrator from here on out. Whether real or not, it is quickly clear that this Jean Paul is a veritable lunatic. At first, his intrusions are mainly complaints and quips about the writing process, his weekly composition of one chapter or section of the book, and his authorly obligations to readers and critics. He then begins to complain more about his illnesses and the ridiculous treatments prescribed (including walking along fresh furloughs, and sleeping with dogs so as to transfer the sickness to them), establishing himself as an out-of-control hypochondriac. It really comes to a head about two-thirds through the book, in a succession of sections lasting only one paragraph, being, evidently, as much as he can manage to write in his weakened state—his illness has been aggravated by the addition of both a lizard and a gooseberry bush growing in his stomach. After this drama and a lecture from the doctor, he is back on track, accompanying Gustavus and Beata to the resort of Lilienbad, where he writes a series of exuberant “joy sections,” just one instance of dizzying sharp turns in mood that fill the novel.

As if this were not enough, the novel is enhanced, or distracted, by many “extra leaves,” where Jean Paul puts forth his opinions on things as diverse as the spice trade, the wiles of romance writers, the soporific effects of church architecture, dolls and their potential to make religion appealing to fashionable folk, and, my favorite, a section devoted to proving that after a certain number of years, adultery is scientifically justified because of the body’s property of completely replacing all its cells with new ones every seven years. Though I was often frustrated with trying to keep up with the characters and the actual events, reading this book was so entertaining because of his diversions. Aside from the humor, my other favorite part of his writing is his facility in inserting imaginative, technicolored, dreamy descriptions; mostly of the natural world.

However, because of how strongly Jean Paul’s character influences the quality of his writing, the middle sections where he is apparently ailing become quite difficult to read. As he professes himself how unpleasant it is for him to write them, it is no more enjoyable for the reader. While as a whole, the density and lack of clear focus in The Invisible Lodge make it exhausting to read, these sections were particularly draining.

In spite of (or because of?) all this, I am glad that I got through the whole book. I kind of wish I had Jean Paul’s indefatigable knack for spouting long and ridiculous sentences, but perhaps it’s better for the sane world that there aren’t too many people like him.