1 - The Art of Writing in Columns

Summary

“Die Kunst, gut zu lesen ist vielleicht noch seltener als die, gut zu schreiben?”

(Arno Schmidt, “Dichtergespräche im Elysium”)

According to Schmidt, Zettel's Traum borrows its “SpaltenTechnick” from Finnegans Wake. By structuring Zettel's Traum into three columns or “TextSträhnen,” Schmidt expects that the reader will be able to follow the information provided in the columns. To ease the reading process, Schmidt divides the three columns according to theme. The center column reflects the events of the years between 1965 and 1969, the time frame in which Zettel's Traum was actually written. Daniel Pagenstecher, as the central narrator of the events, assists Paul and Wilma Jacobi, likewise writers and old school friends, in the translation of Poe's works into German. The Jacobis had visited Dan to ask him for advice in this work. Daniel Pagenstecher acts as the expert on Poe since he has read him for forty years. Accompanying the Jacobis is Franziska, their sixteen-year-old teenage daughter, who thinks she is in love with the much older Dan. Throughout the day, the four discuss aspects of Poe's writings such as his choice of vocabulary, his favorite words and authors, metaphors, composition, and footnotes. During their discussions Daniel Pagenstecher discloses his so-called etym theory. Etyms are morphemes or word roots unknown to conscious thought, which Pagenstecher uses to demonstrate the activities of the unconscious. Adopting Freud's symbol interpretation in combination with the etym theory Dan explicates Poe's work in order to expose its internal symbolism as tied to sublimated yet still polyvalent sexual fantasies.