Caspar Hauser. Wasserman Ya.

Jacob Wassermann (1873-1934)-a bright representative of the era of the Munich and Vienna Modern of the 1890-1900s, the “World Star of the novel” (T. Mann). Along with the characteristic of his time, interest in the problem of sex, in the symbolist modernization of historical subjects, the impressionistic lightness of the pen of his work is distinguished by something special: he not only outlined the parameters of the German intellectual novel, but also tried to “return to the world of God” in postnetzhevskoye time, He created a whole gallery of characters not from this world - special seekers of the highest meaning, who, contrary to the indifference of a bourgeois society to the highest needs of life, seek to bring the perfect dimension to the world at all costs. In his best creation, the novel about Kaspar Hauser (1908), the writer turns to the legendary figure of the mysterious found, who attracted the attention of the whole of Europe and still in the role of a kind of “iron mask” remains one of the cult figures of German history. He did not know how to speak and write, who saw everything as if for the first time, this mysterious young man, an alien from “Dark from nowhere”, was just as mysteriously killed a few years after his wonderful appearance. His origin remained a mystery, while death stirred up all the thinking Europe and still excites the minds of lovers of historical puzzles. So who is he, Caspar, is the victim of the conspiracy (as a contender for the Baden throne), a genius, not accepted or not understood by the philistines, or a clever hoax? Having studied many historical documents, Wassermann gave his, and very convincing, answer to this question. Psychologically thin, and plotly close to the detective, Caspar Hauser is a philosophical novel about the crisis of German and - wider - the European spirit. In the center of the novel is the figure of a German “idiot”, either an unusual modern saint, or a paradoxical likeness of the Savior himself. The writer put a lot of personal, and not least - difficult reasoning about the ratio in his own work of Europeanism and Jewry. The section “Additions” publishes the translation of the most entertaining and informative chapters of Wassermann's autobiographical book “My Way as a German and Jew” (1921), and in the section “Applications” - an article by the outstanding Russian philologist V.M. Tolmacheva about Jacob Wassermanne, placing the work of this author in the wide historical and literary context, and thorough notes.