Literatur

Abridge or illustrate, retell or simplify: there are many ways to treat the classics of world literature. The publishers keep coming up with new ideas about how to get young people to read Goethe and Schiller.

"Infamous! most infamous Charles! Oh, had I not my forebodings, when, even as a boy, he would scamper after the girls, and ramble about over hill and common with ragamuffin boys and all the vilest rabble; when he shunned the very sight of a church as a malefactor shuns a gaol [...]?" With these words, Franz Moor bad-mouths his brother to his father in Schiller's drama "Die Räuber". Obviously, some 225 years later, no-one uses that sort of language any more. But what young person still understands exactly what Franz is saying?

There is a running debate about how to make children and adolescents familiar with the classics of world literature despite the manifest language barriers. The German book market confronts the reader with a wide diversity of attempts to achieve this end.

Abridged for Excitement

"Gulliver's Travels", "Moby Dick", "Robinson Crusoe": who has actually read the complete texts of these classics of world literature? In fact, some of them now take up so much space on the children's book shelves that one might think that that is where they originally belonged.

And a whole range of German publishers – such as Arena Verlag or Cecilie Dressler Verlag – are taking classic doorstopper novels and pruning them back into a child-size dose. The result is exciting stories full of adventure.

Gerstenberg Verlag is taking a different approach with its series entitled "Visuelle Bibliothek – Klassiker für Kinder". Here, the emphasis is on the detailed illustrations which accompany the highly abridged texts, and which also illustrate the historical background to the stories.

Illustrated in the Original

Won't what works with Jonathan Swift, Herman Melville and Daniel Defoe also work with Goethe and Schiller, even if the subject matter of Germany's princes of classical literature admittedly promises less adventure and nail-biting tension?

The author and writer of children's books Peter Härtling shows that Goethe and Schiller can very much provide enjoyment for children. His volumes "Ich bin so guter Dinge: Goethe für Kinder" and "... und mich – mich ruft das Flügeltier: Schiller für Kinder", which were published by Insel Verlag in 1998 and 2004, offer poems, letters, excerpts from ballads, novellas, dramas – all in the original language. Whilst children are unlikely to be able to cope with the text on its own, the colourful illustrations by Hans Traxler do open up a humorous approach to Goethe and Schiller for them (and for adults).

Retold with a View to the Future

Berlin's Kindermann Verlag is also covering the German classics. However, Swiss-born Barbara Kindermann is following a different tradition. She retells the classics. "Wilhelm Tell", "Faust", "Götz von Berlichingen", "Nathan der Weise" and "Kleider machen Leute" have appeared so far in her series "Weltliteratur für Kinder" – lovingly illustrated by artists like Klaus Ensikat, Sybille Hein or Maren Briswalter.

Kindermann is not aiming to replace the original. Rather, she wants young people to have enjoyable memories of her retelling, so that they fancy tackling the real thing. The children should be happy when they meet the now familiar figures again in the classroom.

More Simple than Classical

Whilst there is a high tolerance level when the classics are recast as children's books, the literary critics and specialists in German studies sometimes react very sensitively when the supreme cultural artefacts make their way into the classroom in a "light" version. An example is the series "... einfach klassisch" from Cornelsen Verlag, which has been harshly criticised in the publications of the Association of German Studies Specialists. There has even been talk of cultural outrage.

Cornelsen's series includes simplified versions of "Götz von Berlichingen", "Wilhelm Tell", "Kabale und Liebe" and "Kleider machen Leute". Whilst the publisher describes them as "vocabulary and syntax adapted carefully to modern German" and "abridged appropriately", experts in German literature use the words "sloppy", "arbitrary", "distorting" or "wrong". When the publisher argues that teachers of less able secondary school students in particular see no other way to read the classics with the poor readers in their classes, the critics accuse these teachers of making life too easy and lacking creativity.

Modern Times?

The guardians of culture have even less time for the series "klassik modern" from Verlag Moderne Zeiten. Two journalists – Jochen Dersch and Thomas Kuehn – bring Goethe and Schiller down to the level of penny dreadfuls, because – as Dersch says: "Every work can be transferred into modern language without loss of quality." Their version of "Die Räuber, freely based on Friedrich Schiller", has sold more than 10,000 copies. And in it, by the way, Franz Moor's tirade against his brother reads as follows: " 'Oh father', cries Franz. 'Don't take it to heart like that. It's been on the cards for ages. That ... that stupid idiot, he's ruining the whole family!' "