The Influence of India and Persia on the Poetry of Germany | Page 9

sources.

In the eighteenth century the Oriental tale was extremely popular in France, and thence it spread to other countries. The translation of the Thousand and One Nights by Galland (Paris, 1704-1712) and of the Persian Tales by P��tis de La Croix called into being a host of similar French productions, which in turn found their way into German literature. The most fruitful writer in this genre was Simon Gueulette, the author of _Soir��es Bretonnes_ (1712) and Mille et un quart d'heures (1715). The latter contains the story of a prince who is punished for his presumption by having two snakes grow from his shoulders. To appease them they are fed on fresh human brain.[75] Of course, we recognize at once the story of the tyrant Zahhak familiar from Firdausi. The material for the _Soir��es_ was drawn largely from Armeno's Peregrinaggio, which purports to be a translation from the Persian, although no original is known to scholars.[76] From these _Soir��es_ Voltaire took the material for his Zadig.[77] In most cases, however, all that was Oriental about such stories was the name and the costume. So popular was the Oriental costume that Montesquieu used it for satirizing the Parisians in his Lettres Persanes (1721). Through French influence the Oriental story came to Germany, and so we get such works as August Gottlob Meissner's tales of Nushirvan_, _Massoud_, _Giaffar_, _Sadi and others,[78] or Klinger's Derwisch_. Wieland used the Eastern costume in his Schach Lolo_ (1778) and in his politico-didactic romance of the wise Danischmende. This fondness for an Oriental atmosphere continues even into the nineteenth century and may be seen in such works as Tieck's Abdallah_ and Hauff's _Karawane. But this brings us to the time when India and Persia were to give up their secrets, and when the influence of their literature begins to be a factor in the literature of Europe.
FOOTNOTES:
[49] See Kunstmann, Die Fahrt der ersten Deutschen nach dem portugiesischen Indien in Hist. pol. Bl?tter f. d. Kath. Deutschl., M��nchen, 1861, vol. 48, pp. 277-309.
[50] For title see Panzer, Annalen d. ?lteren deutsch. Litt., N��rnb. 1788.
[51] See Gr?sse, op. cit. ii. 2. pp. 773, 774.
[52] Des Welt-ber��hmten Adami Olearii colligirte und viel vermehrte Reise-Beschreibungen etc., Hamb. 1696, chap. xxv.
[53] Ibid. chap. xxviii. p. 327 seq.
[54] Olearius, op. cit., Preface to the Rosenthal. Full title of Ochsenbach's book in Buch der Beispiele, ed. Holland, p. 258, n. 1.
[55] Proverbiorum et Sententiarum Persicarum Centuria, Leyden, 1644. In the preface the author says that he undertakes his work, "cum e genuinis Persarum scriptis nihil hactenus in Latinam linguam sit translatum."
[56] Iversen in op. cit. chap. xi. p. 157 seq. Cf. Jackson, Die iranische Religion in Grdr. iran. Ph. iii. pp. 633, 634, 636.
[57] Sanson in op. cit. pp. 48, 49.
[58] Fr. Schlegel, Weisheit der Indier, Heidelb. 1808, Vorrede, p. xi.
[59] See preface to op. cit.
[60] Ideen zur Phil. d. Gesch. der Menschheit, chap. iv. ed. Suphan, vol. 13, p. 415.
[61] The story is given in Chardin's book, though this was not the source. See Andreas Gryphius Trauerspiele, ed. Herm. Palm, BLVS. vol. 162, pp. 138, 139.
[62] See Zoroasters Telescop oder Schl��ssel zur grossen divinatorischen Kabbala der Magier in Das Kloster ed. J. Scheible, Stuttg. 1846, vol. iii. p. 414 seq., esp. p. 439.
[63] Widmann's Faust in Das Kloster, vol. ii. p. 296; Der Christlich Meynende, ibid. ii. p. 85.
[64] Christoph. Wagners Leben, ibid. vol. iii. p. 78.
[65] Ibid. ii. p. 1004.
[66] Ed. by Felix Bobertag, KDNL. vol. 37, Einl. p. 8.
[67] On this see Felix Bobertag, Gesch. des Romans und der ihm verwandten Dichtungsgattungen in Deutschland, Bresl. 1876, vol. ii. 2. pp. 110 seq., 140, 160.
[68] In Der abenteuerliche Simplicissimus ed. Adalb. Keller, Stuttg. 1862 (BLVS. vol. 66), vol. iv. pp. 707 seq.
[69] Op. cit. pp. 759, 760.
[70] Ibid, p. 710; again p. 841.
[71] The Story of Joseph from the Quran was published in Arabic with a Latin version by Erpenius as early as 1617. See Zenker, Bibl. Orient., Leipz. 1846, vol. i. p. 169, No. 1380.
[72] Keller, op. cit. p. 742.
[73] See Jackson, Zoroaster, Appendix V (by Gray).
[74] See Jackson, Zoroaster, pp. 127-132.
[75] Rud. F��rst, Die Vorl?ufer der Modernen Novelle im achtzehnten Jahrhundert, Halle a. S. 1897. p. 51.
[76] Some of the stories are undoubtedly Oriental in origin. The work appeared at Venice, 1557, and was translated into German, in 1583, by Johann Wetzel under the title Die Reise der S?hne Giaffers. Ed. by Herm. Fischer and Joh. Bolte (BLVS, vol. 208), T��b. 1895.
[77] F��rst, op. cit. p. 52. The name is derived from the Arabic [Arabic] "speaker of the truth," as pointed out by Hammer in Red. p. 326. See essay L'ange et l'hermite by Gaston Paris in La Po��sie du Moyen Age, Paris, 1887, p. 151.
[78] F��rst, op. cit. p. 154.
CHAPTER III.
HERDER.
Herder's Interest in the Orient--Fourth Collection of his Zerstreute