Novel
The Adventures of Simplicius Simplicissimus
Der abenteuerliche Simplicissimus
Opening lines
Es eröffnet sich zu dieser unserer Zeit (von welcher man glaubet, daß es die letzte sei) unter geringen Leuten eine Sucht […]
In these times of ours (which are believed to be the last), a craze is arising among humble folk […]
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from zeno.org
Synopsis
A young shepherd from the Spessart, so ignorant that he does not know his own name, sees his family's farm plundered by soldiers and flees into the forest. A hermit takes him in, teaches him to read, instructs him in religion and names him Simplicius, the simple one. After his master's death, he is thrown into the war: page to a governor, jester decked out with donkey's ears, plundering soldier famous under the name of the Hunter of Soest, singer in Paris, charlatan, he passes from one camp to the other.
Context
The book came out in Nuremberg, from Wolff Eberhard Felßecker, under a false address and an anagrammatic pseudonym; published in 1668, it bears the date 1669, hence the sources being split between the two years. To the five books was added in 1669 a Continuatio, which critics regard as the sixth. Its author then attached to it a series of titles that he presented as a single cycle, including the one devoted to Courage, from which Brecht drew Mother Courage. The narrative, which owes a debt to the Spanish picaresque novel, is often taken to be autobiographical; it is nonetheless not a roman à clef.
Who it is for
A big volume, translated into French; it is as well to know that the narrator changes sides more than once and that the scenes of pillage are graphic.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as the first adventure novel in the German language and the most important prose work of the German Baroque.