German Life and Letters 40:4 July 1987 0015-8777 $2.00

SOME THOUGHTS O N T H E SUCCESS O F HANS FALLADA’S KLEINER MANN - W A S NUN?*

JENNIFER WILLIAMS

Monty Jacobs, editor of the Vossische Zeitung, described the serialization of Kleiner Mann - was nun? in the spring of 1932 as ‘ein Erfolg, wie wir ihn seit Remarque nicht verspiirt haben’.‘ By the end of that year 40,000 copies had been sold, a series of foreign publishing houses had acquired translation rights, and plans were well advanced for both a radio play and a film.2 According to a survey published on 10 December 1932 in the Munich journal Das Tagebuch, Kleiner Mann - was nun? was top of the bestseller lists in bookshops all over Germany. Both Hermann Hesse and Carl Zuckmayer nominated it as their favourite book of the year.3 The phenomenon of the bestseller was a relatively recent one in German publishing. Samuel Fischer, who had published the first German bestseller - Kellermann’s Der Tunnel - in 1913, subsequently viewed its rise as an indication of the disintegration of the bourgeois class. Writing in 1926, he lamented the disappearance of a regular cultured reading public which had been replaced by ‘irregular explosions’ in b~ok-buying.~ Kleiner Mann - was nun? came in the wake of Wassermann’s Der Fall Maurizius (1928) and the record- breaking Im Westen nichts Neues (1929). This essay sets out to examine the novel’s impact and to suggest some reasons for its success which continues to the present day in both German state^.^

Contemporary reviewers are almost unanimous in their praise of the novel. Among the few dissenting voices to be heard is a ,certain ‘W. Gtk‘ of the Hamburger Tageblatt, a critic with decidedly Nazi sympathies. He criticizes the novel’s conclusion; he complains that the love scenes are too erotic and attributes this to Jewish influence; he praises ‘das stille Heldentum der SA’ and deplores the portrayal of Lauterbach in the novel. Indeed, for this reviewer the fact that the novel has won Zuckmayer’s approval constitutes sufficient grounds for doubting its literary merit.6 Another reviewer not to join in the almost univer- sal acclaim is Susanne Suhr, who views Kleiner Mann - was nun? from the opposite end of the political spectrum. She criticizes the novel because Pinneberg fails to draw any conclusions from his experiences. She attributes the novel’s success to its providing a good read without questioning the basis of a society which produces unemployment and poverty. She accuses Fallada of failing to provide a viable solution to the question ‘was nun?’ and Pinneberg of failing to rise above the level of a ‘riihrender R~manheld’ .~ Such opinions were, however, very much in the minority; the anonymous critic of the Neues Wiener Journal provides a more representative view:

* I should like to express my thanks to Dr Tom Crepon, Director of the Literaturzentrum Neubrandenburg, and his staff at the Hans Fallada Archive, Feldberg, for their assistance in the writing of this essay. I should also like to thank Frau Anna Ditzen, the author’s first wife, for her hospitality and her patience in answering my questions about her husband’s life and work.

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DaD Liebe starker ist als der Tod, das wui3te man bereits. Aber daD Liebe auch uber Arbeitslosigkeit triumphieren kann, dai3 ein starkes Herz auch inmitten der sozialen Tragodie Mut und Glauben und Liebe bewahren kann, das e r fa r t man aus Falladas ergreifendem Bekenntnis zum kleinen Mann Pinneberg und seiner Frau.8

In later, more difficult times Fallada returned to variations on the title Kleiner Mann - was nun? in the hope of repeating this spectacular success. Kleiner Mann, groJer Mann - alles vertauscht appeared in 1949, Der ungeliebte Mann in 1940 and E i n Mann will nach oben in 1941. These variations on a successful title are particularly ironic since the original novel appears to have owed its success less to the ‘kleiner Mann’ of the title than to his ‘little woman’, Lammchen.

Johannes Boysen, a Frankfurt clergyman, wrote to Fallada on this subject:

Vielleicht habe ich im ‘Kleinen Mann’ Ihre Absicht etwas verschoben, wenn ich Lammchen in den Vordergrund stelle, denn Sie haben gewil3 mit Absicht K1. Mann und nicht Frau geschrieben. Aber dies Frauenbild hat es mir angetan. . .

In fact, contemporary reviews devote much more critical attention to Lammchen than to Pinneberg and she is regarded as the major factor in the novel’s success. Karl Schroder, in a review which appeared in Die Bucherwarte, writes that the whole novel is permeated by ‘der zarte und doch kraftige Hauch eines Liebes- und Eheverhiltnisses, in dem die Frau die Lebensmutigere ist und damit die Tragerin in die Zukunft’.Io Fritz Rosenfeld, writing in the Breslau newspaper Volkswacht f u r Schlesien, explains that Pinneberg never loses hope

weil seine Frau und sein Kind seinem Dasein Inhalt und Sinn verleihen . . . und die Frau, das tapfere Made1 von heute, glucklich, einem Mann Gefahrtin, glucklich, Mutter sein zu durfen, ist eine der schonsten, dichterischen Gestalten, die in den letzten Jahren im deutschen Roman geschaffen wurden. l1

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Karl Dorr of the Fseie Presse in Wuppertal believes that

Ein ganz herrliches Denkmal wird der Frau in diesem Buche gesetzt. Frau Pinneberg, Lhmchen genannt, ist recht nuchtern, praktisch, lebensklug, sehr Iieb zu ihrem Mann, gesund in ihren Lebensansichten und resolut im Anpacken aller realen und irrealen Dinge des Lebens.I2

Indeed, the conclusion reached by the anonymous reviewer in the Sozialistische Monatshefte - that Lammchen is a figure ‘die offenbar die Sehnsuchte vieler Manner unserer Tage in Bewegung setzt’ - seems ine~capab1e.l~

Even a cursory examination of the novel reveals why Lammchen appeared so attractive to male readers. Besides embodying generally admirable characteristics such as courage, honesty and a profound humanity, Lammchen makes very few demands on her husband. On discovering that she is pregnant, she does not ask or expect Pinneberg to marry her but declares ‘ich schaff

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es ~chon’ . ’~ When Pinneberg gets into difficulties Lammchen takes the initia- tive and finds solutions to his problems: it is Lammchen whose letter to Frau Pinneberg secures their escape from Ducherow (p. 75), Lammchen who enlists Jachmann’s assistance in finding work for Pinneberg after he has collapsed in tears of despair (p. 82); Lammchen who, although several months pregnant, goes flat-hunting when life at her mother-in-law’s becomes intolerable (p. 12 1); it is Lammchen who finally takes charge of the household budget, although it is Pinneberg who has worked as a book-keeper (p. 133), and Lammchen who earns money to support the family when Pinneberg becomes unemployed. In fact, Lammchen devotes her life to the support and care of her husband and child. After her marriage to Pinneberg she severs relations with her family and former friends. When faced with the problem of making soup for the first time, she thinks ‘Sie wird Mutter schreiben und fragen, ob das richtig ist. Nein, lieber nicht, lieber allein fertig werden’ (p. 48). The narrator remarks at a later point that Lammchen does not write to anyone in her home town (p. 74). She therefore cuts herself off from her life before she met Pinneberg. Nor does she appear to have made any new friends since her marriage - except of course through Pinneberg. Her exclusive devotion to the needs and desires of her husband and son undoubtedly accounts for Lammchen’s popularity with male readers.

However, her popularity was not restricted to the male reading public. The publishers of Kleiner Mann - was nun? clearly expected it to be a success with women, for it was included in their 1932 ‘Biicher fur Frauen’ catalogue. Lammchen found acclaim among women readers for a variety of reasons. Some, such as Kathe Schonpflug, could identify with Lammchen: ‘Ich habe alles mit Ihrem Lammchen miterlebt, habe mich mit ihr gefreut und um ihr Schicksal gebangt; ich bin namlich auch eine junge Ehefra~ . ’ ’~ Margarete Garduhn, writing in the Pommersche Tagespost, clearly admires Lammchen: ‘Lammchen glaubt trotz allem an ein Besserwerden und halt dadurch ihren Mann iiber Wasser, der sich ohne sie bestimmt hatte treiben und sinken la~sen.’’~ Some women seem to have regarded Lammchen as a model for their own lives:

. . .man mochte ihr unwillkiirlich nachstreben. Unsere arbeitslosen und schwer um ihre Existenz kampfenden Manner konnten wohl daheim auch solche Lammchen gebrauchen, die ihnen helfen kampfen wiirden und ich glaube, wir Frauen konnen uns also unser Lammchen sehr gut zum Vorbild nehmen.

Frau Elise Lapple, who wrote these lines, came seventh in a competition run by the Stuttgart daily newspaper Schwabische Tagwacht, entitled ‘Wie siehst du Lammchen?’. I’ This competition, in which readers were offered prizes for short essays on their views of Lammchen’s appearance and personality, affords a fascinating insight into the general public’s view of the novel. The enthusiasm in all fifteen winning entries - indeed, the very existence of such a competition - testifies to the extent to which the figure of Lammchen caught the popular imagination of the time. The first prize-winner, a printer by the name of Schlipf, was at pains to defend Lammchen’s honour, claiming that Pinneberg was her

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first and only lover. Emma Bachmann, who won second prize, described Lammchen as ‘die neuste deutsche und schonste Madonna’. Frau Schmalacker, who took third prize, regarded Lammchen as an ‘einzigartiges Vorbild aller Frauen’. Friedrich Hoger, who was awarded fourth prize, expressed a wish that more wives could be like Lammchen: ‘Mancher Familie ware geholfen, wenn die Frauen die Not und Arbeitslosigkeit dem Manne nicht allzu stark ankreiden wollten.’ Thus in the figure of Lammchen Fallada did not simply create a character with some genuinely likeable human characteristics. He succeeded in appealing not only to men’s dreams of womanhood but also to women’s aspirations to fulfil those dreams.

Originally Fallada did not envisage such a prominent role for Lammchen; in the novel plan which he submitted to Rowohlt in September 1931 the ‘little man’ was to be the major character and focus of attention.’* It was in the course of writing that Lammchen developed into what Fallada himself described as ‘meine Hauptfigur”’ in the novel. Looking back over the genesis and creation of Kleiner Mann - was nun? Fallada remarked,

Vielleicht wollte ich einmal - ganz im Anfang - ich weii3 das nicht mehr genau - einen Arbeitslosenroman schreiben, aber dann ist dies Buch ganz allmahlich und unmerklich Zeugnis fur eine Frau geworden. Dai3 es so wirkt, das danke ich ihr, und dai3 ich es ihr so danken darf, das macht mich gliicklich.20

The author readily conceded the influence of his first wife, Anna Ditzen, on the figure of Lammchen. Writing to Pastor Boysen in January 1933 Fallada explained: ‘Dies Buch ist der Dank an eine Frau, ein kleiner Teil von einem groBen Dankgefuhl.’21 Fallada’s statement that he viewed the novel as the repayment of a debt of gratitude should caution against an automatic iden- tification of Lammchen with Anna Ditzen. The implied obligation could be expected to affect the depiction of the literary figure, particularly as regards trueness to life. Anna Ditzen herself did not accept the rather romantic iden- tification with Lammchen, as Fallada admitted in the same letter to Pastor Boysen: ‘Was meine Frau ist, die protestiert zwar, wenn man sie fur das Lammchen nimmt und sagt, sie sei alles nur kein Lammchen.’22 In any case a simple equation, Lammchen = Anna Ditzen, is too mathematic a view of an artistic creation.

Despite such considerations the identification of Lammchen with Anna Ditzen has become a convention of Fallada research. Prior to the filming of Kleiner Mann - was nun? in 1967 a journalist published an account of a conversation with Anna Ditzen in Feldberg under the title ‘Bei L a m m ~ h e n ’ , ~ ~ her eightieth birthday in 1981 was marked by an article in the Weltbiihne entitled ‘Lammchen wird acht~ig‘.’~ To dismiss the identification of Lammchen with Anna Ditzen is not to discount the influence of the author’s first wife or indeed the autobiographical dimension in the creation of the novel. Rather, it is the nature of that influence which is at issue.

From the moment in February 1928 when the author was released from Neumunster prison, cured of alcoholism and drug addiction, his fortunes took

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a turn for the better. In October of that year he wrote to his long-standing friend Johannes Kagelmacher ‘dab ich noch einmal dem holden Eros verfallen bin’.p5 A year later, now a married man and expectant father, Fallada told Kagelmacher :

ich bin so glucklich und zufrieden, wie ich es in meinem Leben noch nicht gewesen bin und alles andere spielt daneben keine Rolle. Mit meiner groben Suse* ist es heute noch wie am ersten Tag, besser, seit wir uns besser kennen.26

The author’s experience of marriage and the birth of his first child clearly find expression in Kleiner Mann - was nun?. As far as the depiction of Lammchen is concerned, however, it appears that in a desire to pay tribute to his wife Fallada created an idealised figure which - perhaps not surprisingly - coincided with the largely but not exclusively male ideal of womanhood of his day and thereby contributed to the success of both Lammchen and the novel.

In a letter to Herr Benda Fallada mentions a further two important factors in the novel’s creation:

Ganz abgesehen, dab mir Schreiben Lebenssache ist, etwas wie Atem, ganz abgesehen davon also, glaube ich ein bibchen daran, dab es hilft, ein ganz klein wenig hilft, wenn man den Menschen sagt: seid anstandig zu einander. . . Ich denke so, der Mann hinter dem Krankenkassen- schalter, der meinen Pinneberg abfertigt und hat gerade das Buch gelesen, er ist vielleicht ein ganz klein biBchen netter.27

In correspondence relating to Kleiner Mann - was nun? Fallada frequently makes a plea for decency and humanity in human relations, for the establishment of ‘die Front der Anstandigen. Der Menschlichen’.28

The spectacular success of Kleiner Mann - was nun? took Fallada totally by surprise for, as he confided to Kagelmacher, he did not have a very high opinion of the work: ‘Personlich halte ich ihn fur ein schwacheres Buch von mir.’’g He was particularly aware of the not entirely satisfactory nature of the conclusion: ‘Mich stort immer die etwas private Losung beim “Kleinen Mann”, trotzdem es naturlich keine Patentlosung und vor allen Dingen nicht die mir so oft vorgeschlagene Partei-Losung gibt.’30 He conceded that his solution was very rare: ‘Sie lautet: die Losung, die Erlosung kann nur im Privaten liegen. Im Falle Pinneberg ist es Lammchen, aber ich gebe Ihnen ohne Weiteres zu, dab Lammchen ein Gluckstreffer ist, der Gewinn unter zehntausend Nieter~.’~‘ The fact that Lammchen embodies Fallada’s solution to the question ‘was nun?’ undoubtedly contributes to the depiction of this character. In the first place it probably accounts to a large extent for the idealised view of womanhood portrayed in Lammchen, for no ordinary woman could possibly provide a solution to all the problems facing Pinneberg. Secondly, Lammchen does not develop as a character in the course of the novel; she is unchanging, the eternal mother both in the emotional sense to her husband and in the biological sense

* The author’s affectionate name for his first wife.

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to her son. This idealisation, deriving both from the author’s desire to repay a debt of gratitude to his wife and from the key role assigned to Lammchen as the embodiment of the solution to the problem ‘was nun?’, tends to under- mine the realistic tenor of the novel - a tendency which becomes increasingly obvious towards its conclusion.

In reply to comments by Hermann Broch on a similar happy ending in Wolf unter Wolfen, Fallada wrote in 1937:

-. . . meine Losungen sind Verlegenheitslosungen, es konnte ebensogut anders kommen, nein, es ware vie1 richtiger, wenn mein Pagel* versackte . . .Ich selbst habe mich auf die Linie einer tuchtigen Schlichtheit zuruckgezogen, wie Sie ganz richtig sagen, aber das ist nur ein fauler KompromiB, damit ist es nicht getan. Aber wie a n d e r ~ ? ~ ~

From Fallada’s own comments we may conclude that although he felt dissatisfied with the conclusion of the novel he could not imagine any other outcome.

The motif of the stars and the sky in the last scene of Kleiner Mann - was nun? has its origin in the Pinnebergs’ first meeting on a remote part of the beach between Lensahn and Wiek (pp. 148-49) and is associated with intimacy, the exclusive nature of their relationship, and with escape from the squalor and drudgery of the world around them. On the evening of their engagement they go out onto the balcony of the Morschels’ flat:

Ja, der Himmel ist da uber den Dachern und seine Sterne in ihm. Sie stehen eine Weile schweigend, jedes die Hand auf der Schulter des andern.

Dann kehren sie zu dieser Erde zuriick, mit dem engen Hof, den vielen hellen Fensterquadraten, dem Jazzgequak. (p. 18)

The final tableau which refers back to this scene perfectly encapsulates Fallada’s solution: withdrawal into the private sphere. Escapism? Of course! Therein lay the appeal to many caught up in the social, economic and political turmoil which attended the collapse of the Weimar Republic. Fallada’s solution had the advantage of appearing both attractive and feasible to many readers; it did not require any superhuman feats or heroic acts but a retreat from the world’s ignoble strife into the realm of the emotions. Furthermore, a happy ending in which the hero and heroine find true happiness is a well-tried recipe for success in fiction. In his analysis of bestsellers Sutherland comments:

We are daily bombarded with gloomy news, and most of the population live lives of quiet desperation. Nevertheless, bestsellers invariably have upliftingly happy or providential endings. . . They are anodynes. They soothe. . . But they clearly make lives more livable for millions. . .

Thus, what Fallada regarded as a weakness in the conclusion of his novel was embraced enthusiastically by the reading public.

The depiction of the Pinnebergs’ relationship in Kleiner Mann - was nun? has resulted in such generalized statements as the following, coined by Schueler

* Pagel is the hero of Wo(funter WGlfen

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and embraced by Subiotto: ‘For Hans Fallada a healthy marrige is the very source of human tranquility and social order.’34 In fact, a chronological survey of Fallada’s work reveals the increasing inability of his little men to find tranquility in marriage with their Lammchen figures. This literary develop- ment merely parallels the author’s growing marital difficulties, a constant source of gossip and scandal in Canvitz. Indeed the divorce of Rieke Busch and Karl Siebrecht in Ein Mann will nach oben (1941) anticipates the breakdown of the Ditzens’ marriage which ended in divorce in 1944. The symbol of hope which stands at the end of Fallada’s literary opus is not a Lammchen figure or a romantic marriage idyll but a young man - Kuno Kienschaper in Jeder stirbt

f u r sich allein - who has turned his back on his natural family and who looks forward to a life of fulfilment through work on the land. In the same novel the attempt to establish a private family idyll in the Pinneberg mould by Karl and Trudel Hergesell proves fatal. Hence Schueler’s statement lacks validity both for Hans Fallada the writer and Rudolf D i t ~ e n ~ ~ the man.

It is important in any discussion of Kleiner Mann - was nun? to see in the depiction of the Pinnebergs’ marriage a variety of factors at work: the happi- ness experienced by the author as husband and father in the early years of his marriage to Anna Ditzen; his wish to repay a debt of gratitude to her which resulted in an idealised depiction of womanhood in Lammchen, which, not surprisingly, coincided with the contemporary conventional view of women as wife and mother; the nature of Fallada’s answer to the question ‘was nun?’ which coloured the depiction of Lammchen in the novel. Never again in Fallada’s work is a relationship between a little man and his little woman so unproblematical.

Lethen views the Pinneberg family as ‘ein Vorgriff auf “sozialen Frieden” und zugleich ein Bild der Allianz von Angestellten und Pr~le ta r ia t ’ .~~ It could only be said to anticipate social harmony in a Utopian sense. In the world inhabited by the Pinnebergs Gessler’s comment seems more appropriate: ‘Selbst Lammchens Optimismus und ihr gefestigtes, gutiges Wesen konnen auf die Dauer keine gliickliche Ehe herbeizaubern in einer Welt der “kleinen ent- wurdigten zertretenen L e ~ t e ” . ’ ~ ~ However politically desirable Lethen may consider an alliance between the petty bourgeoisie and the proletariat to be, the Pinnebergs’ union is not one which leads to political action. On the contrary it leads away from involvement in politics into the private sphere which is presented in the novel as the true cradle of humanity.

A further factor in the success of Kleiner Mann - was nun? was the figure of Pinneberg himself. While by no stretch of the imagination an heroic character - indeed Fallada described him on one occasion as ‘was~hlappig’~~ - his was no unique case. In the novel Pinneberg is shown to be a representative figure; he is ‘einer von Millionen’ (p. 91); ‘ein ganz durchschnittlicher junger Mann’ (p. 151); then ‘einer von sechs Millionen’ (p. 232). Feuchtwanger, writing in 1932, regarded this as a typical feature of the contemporary novel: ‘er gibt nicht einen Einzelmenschen, sondern eine ganze Schicht, eine ganze Epoche, er zeigt die Verknupfung des einzelnen mit der Zeit urn ihn und mit der Masse um ihn.’39 The ‘Angestellten’ as a social group and the lower middle class in

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general were particularly adversely affected by the economic crises of the late twenties and early thirties and could identify with the trials and tribulations of the Pinnebergs. 40 Pinneberg‘s middle-class aspirations, evident in the prologue where he feels flattered to be mistaken for Dr Sesam’s son-in-law, his desire to prove to himself and others that he is a cut above the ordinary working man (p. 15) and the gap between such aspirations and his actual earnings were widespread phenomena among the German middle classes in 1932 - as were Pinneberg‘s daily worries about money, employment and his family responsibilities.

In the letter to Herr Benda quoted above Fallada describes writing as ‘Lebenssache’, ‘etwas wie Atem’. His first wife has commented on her husband’s obsessional nature: ‘Fallada war ein besessener, siichtiger Mensch, nicht nur, was das Rauchen und Kaffeetrinken bei der Arbeit betraf, sondern auch das leidenschaftliche Schreiben war im Grunde nichts anderes als eine Art R a ~ s c h . ’ ~ ’

Fallada’s keen observation of the world around him, his own experiences in a wide variety of occupations as well as in prisons and sanatoria provided him with the raw material which his creative mind, informed by a profound humanity, transformed into a wide range of realistic characters and situations instantly recognizable to the reader. Even in the darkest days of Nazi rule when Fallada suffered imprisonment, repeated attacks on his work, including a three- month ban, successive periods of mental illness and financial difficulties, the story-teller in him could not be suppressed; in the trivial and slight works of that period the story-teller can still be discerned at work, often on the most unpromising material. The opening pages of Kleiner Mann - was nun? provide a good example of the story-teller’s art.

The chapter heading at the beginning of the prologue engages the reader’s attention and arouses curiosity about Pinneberg and Lammchen: what is Pinneberg going to discover about Lammchen and what sort of decision will he make? It contains just enough information to whet the appetite without spoiling the reader’s enjoyment. In addition to this anticipatory function the headings throughout the novel provide an aid to comprehension by summarizing the contents of each chapter. The first chapter heading has further significance in that it provides an introduction to the narrator. The narrator’s strategy in starting his account of the story of Pinneberg and Lammchen in front of the doctor’s surgery and not on the beach where they first met has several impor- tant effects: it continues the suspense aroused in the chapter heading; it implies that the narrator not only knows the Pinnerbergs’ future but also their past; and this implied omniscience then invites the reader’s trust.

In his study of bestsellers of the 1930s Cockburn emphasizes that

only a tiny percentage of those who got their novels published in a given year had the qualities and abilities essential to the manufacture of a bestseller. It is a fact which must be recognized by those who tend to overlook or even deny the skilled craftmanship of the b e s t ~ e l l e r . ~ ~

Fallada’s craftmanship is in evidence from the first chapter. Extensive use of paratactical sentence construction, repetition and realistic dialogue produce

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a linguistically and stylistically accessible book. Furthermore, Fallada’s characters often find themselves in everyday situations instantly recognizable to the reader: Pinneberg’s decision to light a cigarette results in the fulfilment of his prophecy: ‘wenn ich mir noch eine Zigarette anbrenne, kommt Lbmchen naturlich sofort um die Ecke’ (p. 5); when Lammchen asks Pinneberg if he is cross with her because she has arrived late, his reply contains an ill-disguised and rather typical reproach: “‘Keine Spur. Nur, wir werden endlos sitzen mussen. Es sind mindestens dreii3ig Leute reingegangen, seit ich warte”’ (p. 5); Pinneberg‘s vanity is flattered by the nurse’s deception (p. 6); Lammchen is embarrassed when in ignorance she unnecessarily takes off her blouse in the doctor’s surgery (p. 7); indeed most readers will have found themselves in at least one of the situations depicted in the first chapter.

The narrator is not without a sense of humour, as he relates how Pinneberg confuses ‘Pessare’ and ‘Pissoirs’ (p. 7). This episode highlights the narrator’s attitude towards his characters which could be described as that of an indulgent father. He is always sympathetic to the Pinnebergs, but from his elevated position of narrative omniscience he allows himself some gentle mockery at their all too human foibles. He brings the first chapter to a satisfactory con- clusion with Pinneberg‘s proposal of marriage and thereby gains the reader’s confidence as someone who is not only in complete control of the story but who is also interested in the Pinnebergs’ happiness.

The first chapter is typical of the novel as a whole: it is short, has a swiftly moving plot line, requires little intellectual effort on the part of the reader but provides an entertaining read. The happy ending inspires confidence in the narrator’s ability to bring the novel to a satisfactory conclusion. Indeed, the narrator’s benign attitude to the Pinnebergs makes a happy ending to the novel almost inevitable, It is due to this attitude that the narrator succeeds in securing the reader’s trust - a trust which he does not betray.

The discrepancy between Fallada’s view of his novel and its public reception recurred two years later with Wir hatten ma1 ein K i n d which he regarded as his best work to date. The reviews in Germany were on the whole not very favourable, although Riemkasten, the self-appointed Fallada expert of the time, applauded the novel’s breadth and depth and believed it surpassed Kleiner Mann - was nun?.43 Most Nazi reviewers were hostile, except Hanns Lerch who praised Fallada’s ‘Rasseempfinden, Blutsempfinden und B~denstandigkeit’.~~ Fallada expressed his disappointment at the gap between his perception of these two novels and that both of the literary critics and of the reading public in the above-mentioned letter to Dr Gawronski, which also gives a unique insight into his view of Kleiner Marin - was nun?:

Fur einen Schriftsteller ist nichts peinlicher, als wenn er erfahrt, wie sehr die Leute auch seine weniger geratenen Kinder loben und lieben, und wie fremd ihnen gerade der Lieblingssohn ist. Die fast einmutige Ablehnung, die mein Gantschow* bei einem deutschen Lesepublikum,

* Gantschow is the hero of Wir hutten mal cin Kind.

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und vor allem bei den Frauen, erfahren hat und der Beifall, der den waschlappigen Pinneberg, der nur etwas durch seine Frau ist, umbrandet, und nun noch dazu in einem Film, den ich gottlob mir nie angesehen habe - machen mir immer noch Kummer.

The success of Kleiner Mann - was nun? in 1932 may be attributed to a variety of factors, some of which, as we have seen, lay outside the author’s control. However, the subsequent success of the novel merits further investigation.

The Nazis’ coming to power in 1933 did not affect sales of the book. They did however insist that the original dust-cover design by George Grosz be changed. None of Fallada’s subsequent works enjoyed such favourable treatment by the Nazi press and censorship apparatus. Thoming has charted the publishing history of Kleiner Mann - was nun? in the Federal Republic from 1950 to 1973, which shows the publication of some 24,000 copies per year in the fifties, declining to around 15,000 in the sixties and early seventies.45 A reversal in this downward trend took place from the mid-seventies onwards with a new edition appearing in 1980. Lethen’s description of the novel as a ‘Krisenbestsellei applies therefore not only to 1932 but to subsequent periods of economic difficulty and social i n~ tab i l i t y .~~ Two of the most recent books on Kleiner Mann - was nun?, Mayer’s and Frotscher’s, are aimed at the teaching profession, a sign that the novel has joined the ranks of the German classics.

Fallada died in 1947 in what was then the Soviet Zone of Occupation and in a graveside oration Johannes R . Becher gave an assessment of the author‘s life and work which formed the subsequent GDR view:

Seine Liebe aber galt dem einfachen Leben und den kleinen Leuten. DaD das einfache Leben oft hochst kompliziert war und was an GroBem in diesen kleinen Leuten traumte, das schilderte er uns meisterhaft. Er kannte sich in dem Leben dieser kleinen Leute aus wie kaum einer, und wahrheitsgetreu reflektierte er ihre Stimmungen; diese seine Starke war zugleich auch seine menschlich-kiinstlerische Schwache. Er unterlag oft nur allzu willig den Stimmungen und Schwankungen jener Schichten, er registrierte und vibrierte mit, wo er sich hatte entgegensetzen und Widerstand hatte leisten miissen. Aber er hatte das Herz doch auf dem rechten Fleck. . . 4 7

Kleiner Mann - was nun? was filmed in the GDR in 1967 and the novel reached its seventh edition in 198248 - an indication of both official approval and popular demand. The acquisition in the late seventies by the GDR ‘Akademie der Kiinste’ of the Fallada archive material which had been lying largely neglected in the Braunschweig cellar since 1957 and the opening of the ‘Hans Fallada Haus’ in Feldberg in February 1981 renewed interest in the life and work of the author. Anna Ditzen, a resident of Feldberg, has taken an active interest in the work of the archive.49 Two very different Failada biographies have emanated from the GDR in recent neither of which, curiously, is included in Frotscher’s discussion of the novel.51

Peter Zadek‘s spectacular Fallada review, Jeder stirbt fjir sich all&, provides a further illustration of the continued interest in the author‘s life and work.

315

3 16 THE SUCCESS OF K L E I N E R MANN - WAS NUN?

This review of Fallada’s life was staged to great acclaim in West Berlin in 1981 and starred the GDR actor Hilmar Thate in the role of Hans Fallada.52

Thus the popularity of Kleiner Mann - was nun? continues in both German states and Fallada is still known to posterity as the author of a novel which owed its success less to the ‘little man’ of the title than to his ‘little woman’ and which the author did not consider to rank among his best work. However, for those who - like the present writer - share Fallada’s despair at this state of affairs there is perhaps one indication that it will not continue indefinitely. While some of the factors which contributed to the novel’s success in the past - its linguistic accessibility, stylistic simplicity, the realistic depiction of the petty bourgeois male predicament, the social criticism - may retain some validity, surely the depiction of womanhood as exemplified by Lammchen no longer corresponds to a female (or even male?) ideal. Is it too much to hope that what once contributed to the novel’s success might ultimately be responsible for its decline, that readers in the eighties might no longer be attracted uncritically to a character which one contemporary critic described as ‘little, brave soft Bunny’?53

This would then open the way for a more balanced assessment of Fallada’s literary output which ranges from the documentary novel Bauern, Bonzen und Bomben, through his own favourite Wir hatten ma1 ein Kind, the epic works Wolf unter Wolfen and Der eiserne Gustav and the intensely personal Der Trinker to the anti-fascist Jeder stirbt f u r sich allein.

NOTES

Letter to Hans Fallada, 24.6.1932, Hans Fallada Archive, Feldberg. All letters cited below are located in this archive. ‘ W. Liersch, Hans Fallada. Sein groJes kleines Lebm, Dusseldorf/Cologne 1981, p. 233. Das Tagebuch, 17.12.1932.

’ S. Fischer, Bemerkungen zur Bucherkrise, Leipzig 1926, pp. 216ff. ’ For data relating to the publishing history of Fallada’s work in the post-war period, see Jiirgen

C. Thoming, ‘Hans Fallada. Seismograph gesellschaftlicher Krisen’, in Zeitkrifischc Romane des 20. Jahrhunderfs, ed. Hans Wagener, Stuttgart 1975, pp. 97-123.

Hamburgcr Tageblatt, 12.10.1932. ’ S. Suhr, ‘Ein Held wird entdeckt’, Der Frcie Angesfcllte, Berlin 16.10.1932. * Quoted in the 1932 Rowohlt catalogue ‘Biicher fur Frauen’, Hans Fallada Archive, Feldberg.

lo Karl Schroder, ‘Kleiner Mann - was nun?’, Die Bi ickwarfe , Berlin 1932, H. 7 , 98. ” Fritz Rosenfeld, ‘Neuentdeckte Wirklichkeit’, Volkswuchf fu r Schlesien, Breslau 23.11.1932. ’‘ Karl Dorr, Freie Presse, Wuppertal 10.9.1932. I s Sorialisfische Monatshcft, Berlin 29.7.1932. I‘ Hans Fallada, Kleincr Mann - war nun?, Reinbek bei Hamburg 1976, p. 10. This is the edition to which all subsequent references are made. l5 Letter to the editor of the Vossische Zeifung, 26.6.1932. l6 Margarete Garduhn, Pommcrsche Tagesposf, Stettin 11.8.1932.

Letter from Johanna Boysen to Hans Fallada, 9.1.1933.

THE SUCCESS OF K L E I N E R M A N N - W A S N U N ? 317

17 caw’ ie siehst du Lammchen?“ Die Losung unseres Preisratsels’, Schwabische Tagwacht, Stuttgart 27.2.1933. Is T. Crepon, Leben und Tode des Hans Fallah, Hamburg 1981, p. 159. ” Letter to Herr von Brentano, 2.7.1932. ‘O Letter to Herr Hiinich, 17.10.1932.

Letter to Johannes Boysen, 7.1.1933. ’’ Frau Ditzen has confirmed her objection to being closely identified with Lammchen in con- versation with the present writer. 23 J. Nossig, ‘Bei Lammchen’, Filmspiegel, Berlin (GDR) 11.1.1967, 18f. “ W. Liersch, ‘Lammchen wird achtzig‘, Wcltbiihnc, 76/9 (1981), 267-69. ” Letter to J. Kagelmacher, 21.10.1928. 26 Letter to J. Kagelmacher, 5.10.1929. 27 Letter to Herr Benda, 3.11.1932.

Letter to Johannes Boysen, 7.1.1933. ‘’ Letter to J. Kagelmacher, 17.10.1932. 30 Letter to Dr Katz, 10.11.1932. 31 Letter to herr Benda, 3.11.1932. 32 Letter to H. Broch, quoted in H a m Fallmla. Werk und Wirkung, ed. R. Wolff, Bonn 1983, p. 136. 33 J. Sutherland, Bestscllns, London 1981, pp. 245-6 34 Quoted by A. V. Subiotto, “‘Kleiner Mann - was nun?” and “Love on the Dole”: Two Novels of the Depression’, in Weirnar Getmany: Writers and Politics, ed. A. Bance, Edinburgh 1982, p. 85. 35 Fallada’s real name was Ditzen, not Itzen as Subiotto suggests on p. 78 ofthe essay quoted above. 36 H. Lethen, NEW Snchlichkeit 1924-1932. Studitn zur Lifcratur dcs Wet& Sozklismus, Stuttgart 1970, p. 160. 37 A. Gessler, Hans Fallah. Lebtn und W n k , Berlin 1976, p. 51. 38 Letter to Dr Gawronski, 6.4.1936. 39 L. Feuchtwanger, ‘Der Roman von heute ist international‘ (1932), in Ein Buch nurfur meine Frcunde, Frankfurt a.M. 1984, p. 423.

For a description of the changes in the social structure of Germany between the two World Wars as they affected the ‘Angestellten’ see D. Mayer (ed.), Hans Faltada: Kleiner Mann - was nun?, Frankfurt a.M./Berlin/Munich 1978, chap. 2. ” ‘Gesprach zwischen Anna Ditzen. . . und Dr Tom Crepon, Leiter des Literaturzentrums, aus AnlaD des 30. Todestages des Dichters am 5 . Februar 1977’, Hans Fallada Archive, Feldberg. “ C. Cockburn, Bestselln. The Books that Evnyonc Read, 1930-1939 London 1972, p. 11. ” National-Zeitung, Essen 3.11.1935. “ Dresahn Nachrichten, 6.12.1934. ” See note 5, above. 46 Lethen, p. 165. ” J. R. Becher, Uber Hans Falloh, Berlin, n.d. ” ‘Zum 90. Geburtstag des deutschen Schriftstellers Hans Fallada’, Bibhographisthe Kalendcrblatfer d n Bnliner Stadtbibliothck, 2517 (1983), 25. 49 For a detailed account of Dr Crepon’s rescue of the Fallada letters and manuscripts which Fallada’s second wife, Ulla Lorsch, had sold piecemeal to a butcher in Braunschweig in order to finance her drug addiction, see T. Crepon, ‘Hans Fallada und seine Erben’, in Hans Fallada und seine Erbm, Neubrandenburg 1983, pp. 4-24.

318 THE SUCCESS OF KLEINER MANN - WAS NUN?

Crepon, Lebcn und To&, first published in the Mitteldeutscher Verlag, HallelLeipzig 1978, and 50

Liersch, Huns Fulfodn, first published by the Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1981. 51 Hans Jiirgen Frotscher, Hans Fallah: KIeinn Mann - wus nun?, Munich 1983. 52 See Zez’tmuguzin, 16.1.1981, 2 and 14-24. 53 Elsie Robinson, “‘Little Man” - You and I - “What Now?”’, Listen World, 9.3.1934.