D. Worlds Apart
V. Fast and Slow Processes
in the portrayal of a type such as this, Stifter develops a psychological background to this encounter that serves to motivate what follows;40 in other words, there are deeper narrative- psychological reasons for why Stephan is drawn to Gabriele in addition to her physical beauty. As I argued in the previous chapter, it is worth asking the question of why an individual develops an infatuation; in this novella, one major factor is the similarity of their childhoods. The beginning of a romantic relationship usually includes the discovery of shared aspects of one’s life narrative (which can serve as a starting point for a future shared narrative), and this is of such importance that participants may even construe elements of their histories as aligned, even if the similarity is in fact tenuous.41 Conversely, individuals with a similar history often have an affinity for one another before they are aware of their commonalities, which would fall under the category of mysterious psychological dynamics mentioned in the narrator’s introductory reflections. In the case of the Major, “sein Vater hatte ihn auf dem Lande auferzogen, um ihn für das Leben
vorzubereiten.” (449) Following his education, his father first sends him to travel abroad and then introduces him to society, giving the impression that there was a carefully thought-out plan to his upbringing. Gabriele was likewise raised in the country according to her father’s wishes; she is described as “die Tochter eines greisen Grafen, der in der Nachbarschaft wohnte, ein wildes Geschöpf, das ihr Vater auf dem Lande erzog, wo er ihr alle und jede Freiheit ließ, weil er meinte, daß sie sich nur so am naturgemäßesten entfalte, und nicht zu einer Puppe gerathe, wie er sie nicht leiden konnte.” (458) Gabriele thus shares childhood narratives, which are highly influential since they are acquired during formative years, with the Major; however, an important difference is that her father purposefully avoided any kind of set plan in her upbringing. Nevertheless, the
40 Dittmann recognizes that Gabriele has a positive side in “ihrer Spontaneität” (“Brigitta und kein Ende,”
25) and thus that her character is not exclusively limited to representing the “Klischee der Verführerin, die vordergründig eine Ehe zerstört” (ibid., 24).
41 This tendency plays a part in the ‘loved you all my life’-script as well as its close relative, the ‘known you all my life’-script; see page 96.
idea that too much exposure to society ruins a young person is an influential one, being shared not only by these two fathers, but also by Johannes the Seducer, who remarks that there is “not much to steal” from girls raised in a “very sociable house.”42 Even society would seem to agree, judging by the way it responds to the young Major/Stephan Murai:
Hier wurde er bald der fast einzige Gegenstand der Gespräche. Einige rühmten seinen Verstand, andere sein Benehmen und seine Bescheidenheit, wieder andere sagten, daß sie nie etwas so schönes gesehen hätten, als diesen Mann. Mehrere behaupteten, er sei ein Genie, und wie es an Verläumdungen und Nachreden auch nicht fehlte, sagten manche, daß er etwas Wildes und Scheues an sich habe, und daß man es ihm ansehe, daß er in dem Walde auferzogen worden sei. (449–450)
The description of the Major as having something “wild” and “shy” about him further underscores the affinity between him and Gabriele. In addition, society seems to have virtually the same impression — in a masculine version — of him as he has of Gabriele: “hier führte ihm das
Schicksal ein ganz anderes Weib entgegen, als er es immer zu sehen gewohnt war.” (457–458) The difference that he perceives in her is not merely external, for there had also been beautiful women in Vienna, whom he blithely ignored in favor of Brigitta;43 it has to do with Gabriele’s demeanor, which is free of conventional, bourgeois romantic scripts. Notably, however, Brigitta was also
42 Kierkegaard, Either/Or, Part I, 339.
43 “[S]ein Auge ging an den größten Schönheiten, die ihn umringten, vorüber, das ihre mit sanfter Bitte zu suchen.” (454) In an otherwise highly insightful article, Dittmann inexplicably claims that Brigitta’s ugliness is an “ärgerlicher Lesefehler” (“Brigitta und kein Ende,” 28). Yet contrary to his assertion that the narrator does not communicate to the reader the impression that Brigitta is ugly, the narrator does indeed comment on her ugliness when he sees the portrait of her as a young woman; in fact, his recognition of it despite the painter’s attempts at “Verschleierung” emphasize that it was very obvious. While it is noteworthy that the narrator never describes the 40-year-old Brigitta as ugly, this is likely due to the influence that her inner qualities have already begun to exert on his faculties of perception; namely, the Major’s high praise has predisposed the narrator to think well of her, and this in turn would influence how he perceives her physical appearance through mechanisms of subjective distortion. Also, in the reconciliation scene, when Brigitta’s features “in unnachahmlicher Schönheit strahlten” (473), the choice of verb suggests not that they are beautiful, but rather that their expression is beautiful. Also, the implication is that this forms a stark contrast to her usual appearance. By making the contrast extreme, the narrative implies that the power of inner beauty and forgiveness is very great indeed to have been able to overcome such an aesthetic obstacle.
So when Kreuzer agrees with Dittmann that Brigitta’s ugliness cannot be “unumstritten angenommen”
(“Zur ‘unerhörten’ Erzähldramaturgie,” 27), this is based on a misreading that conflates the very two properties which the story — according to the narrator’s reflections at the beginning — seeks to differentiate: inner versus outer beauty.
raised apart from society, though the circumstances were different: her family lived in town, but she herself maintained a separation that was not so much spatial as emotional. This has
disadvantages that come to the fore over the course of the novella, but also one advantage that makes her attractive to the Major: “Weil sie ihr Herz nicht durch Liebesgedanken und
Liebesbilder vor der Zeit entkräftet hatte, wehte der Odem eines ungeschwächten Lebens in seine Seele.” (455) This, too, is freedom from the romantic scripts of society; although Brigitta and Gabriele initially appear to be opposites, they are similar in many ways, as well. The “großen wilden Augen” (447) of the young Brigitta attest to the fact that all three characters — Gabriele, Stephan, and Brigitta — belong in the category of the wild.44
The Major’s infidelity to Brigitta appears in this light not as an outright reversal in what he values in a woman, but rather as a confusion over which variety of wildness best matches up with his own.45 For in spite of the similarities, Gabriele’s unchecked development into “gleichsam ein Abgrund von Unbefangenheit” (458) contrasts starkly with Brigitta’s introversion. They represent two variations on wildness: Gabriele is the beautiful version and Brigitta the ugly; Gabriele suffers from having been raised with too few boundaries, Brigitta from having had too many. And in the final scene, when the narrator sees Gabriele’s grave, it implies a statement about their relative resilience: Gabriele is like the lilies that adorn her tombstone, frail and doomed to an early death;
whereas Brigitta is like a root which, though the foliage be cut away, can still sprout anew. The
“kleinen Würzlein” which once “in den Fels des eigenen Herzens schlagen mußten, und da
44 Another example is the portrait of Brigitta in the Major’s study: “der Blick war wild.” (440) See also Sima Kappeler, who likewise argues that Brigitta and Gabriele have striking similarities despite the contrast in their appearance (First Encounters in French and German Prose Fiction, 1830–1883 (New York: Lang, 1996), 153f.). In addition, Ortrud Gutjahr’s observation that Stephan has certain feminine characteristics suggests another similarity that binds the three characters together (“Das ‘sanfte Gesetz’ als psychohistorische Erzählstrategie in Adalbert Stifters ‘Brigitta’” in Psychoanalyse und die Geschichtlichkeit von Texten, ed.
Johannes Cremerius and Wolfram Mauser (Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 1995), 289).
45 For an interesting alternative take on the relation between the three characters, see Christine Oertel Sjögren, “The Allure of Beauty in Stifter’s Brigitta,” Journal of English and Germanic Philology 81, no. 1 (1982):
esp. 50.
trotzen” (447) are known in later life not for their subterranean, unprepossessing nature, but rather for what they are able to achieve in the world through hard work.
Comparable dynamics of speed and slowness operate on the reader of Brigitta, who is initially presented with a series of long descriptive passages in a style very typical of Stifter. This particularly applies to the descriptions of landscape in the two sections that constitute the first half of the novella. Many readers of works by Stifter have deplored such expanses of text, complaining that there is not enough action to hold their interest. The second half, by contrast, offers more plot- and character-driven sequences, culminating in the two suspenseful moments of the confrontation with the wolves and the reconciliation of Brigitta and Stephan. These passages offer a ‘fast’ reading experience, both in the sense that the reader’s awareness of the passage of time decreases in response to a high level of engagement, and in the sense that these portions of text are actually shorter.