Carl Spitteler (1845-1924)

Carl Spitteler even evolved his own metrical scheme in the vast and original work. The epic poem depicted the rise of new gods to consciousness and power. In several works Spitteler dealt with the antagonism between creativity and the world, exemplified in the character of Prometheus.

Carl Spitteler was born in the town of Liestal, near Basel. The family moved to Bern in 1849, when his father was appointed treasurer of the new Swiss confederation. However, the young Spitteler remained in Basel with his aunt. Spitteler started to write poems at the age of seventeen. Under the influence of the historian Jakob Burckhard, who was his teacher at the Basel Pädagogium, and the philologist Wilhelm Wackernagel, he became interested in the Italian Renaissance. In 1863 Spitteler entered the University of Zurich, where he studied law. Between the years 1865 and 1870 he studied theology in Zürich, Heidelberg, and Basel.

After declining an offer to start a career as a Protestant minister, Spitteler went in 1871 to St. Petersburg at the invitation of General Standertskjöld. He worked there eight years as a tutor in Finnish families and visited Finland many times. During this period Spitteler spent most of his time on Prometheus Und Epimetheus (1881), an epic verse, which he had started while a student in Heidelberg. It contrasted ideals with dogmas, personified by two mythological figures. Prometheus is an individualist who opposes King Epimethus, an upkeeper of conventional values. The book was published at Spitteler's own expense under the pseudonym Carl Felix Tandem and did not gain much attention, except when Spitteler was later accused of having borrowed themes from Nietzsche's Also Sprach Zarathustra. Nietzsche had recommended him to the editor of the Munich periodical Kunswart in 1887. Spitteler was well acquainted with Nietzsche's ideas, and published in 1888 in the Berner Bund a review of Nietzsche's work. In Meine BeEZiehungen Zu Nietzshe (1908) Spitteler later defended himself against accusations.

Spitteler's dichotomy between Prometheus and Epimetheus was picked up by Carl Jung, who created in his book Psychological Types his introvert/extrovert distinction. Especially Spitteler's Prometheus and Epimethus inspired Jung. The Swiss psychiatrist also sent a copy of his book to the author. Spitteler did not respond immediately but later referred to the book during a lecture and said that his Prometheus and Epimethus meant nothing, "that he might just as well have sung, 'Spring is come, tra-la-la-la'". (Jung in Memories, Dreams, Reflections, 1963) Jung returned again to Spitteler's reaction in Modern Man in Search of a Soul (1933), stating that "poets are human beings, and that what a poet has to say about his work is often far from being the most illuminating word on the subject".

Abandoning all hope of making poetry his living, Spitteler worked as a teacher in Neuveville and journalist for Grenzpost (1885-86) and Neue Zurcher Zeitung (1890-92). In the 1880s he also published poetry, including Extramundana (1883) and Schmetterlinge (1889). In 1883 Spitteler married Marie op der Hoff, who was his pupil in Neuveville. When his wife's parents died and left in 1892 a sizable inheritance, the family moved to Lucerne, where Spitteler devoted himself entirely to writing. His breakthrough work, the epic verse Olympischer Fruhling, appeared in several installments between 1900 and 1905, and was revisited in 1910. After the publication of Felix Weingartner's pamphlet Carl Spitteler, ein künstlerisches Erlebnis (1904) the poet started to receive recognition outside Switzerland. Olympian Spring examined universal concerns about life. It is a combination of mythology, fantasy, and religion, written in iambic hexameter. Spitteler described colorfully mythical figures as they fight for power and basically transformed the "waxing and waning of the gods into a myth of the seasons." (Carl Jung) The work was immediately acclaimed as a masterpiece and compared to Milton's achievements. In 1906 appeared his novel Imago. The love story, which examined the power of the unconscious, focused on a conflict between an uncompromising creative mind and middle-class restrictions. Imago had a success among psychoanalysts. It has been said, that Spitteler's treatment of the concept of the imago influenced the psychoanalytical understanding of human mind. Spitteler himself once said, "Dreams cannot be told; they dissolve when the rational mind tries to grasp them in words."

Kannst du ein wohl gemeintes Wort vertragen?
Ich muss, vergib.
Ich will dir's einmal deutch und deutlich sagen:
Wer hat dich lieb?
(from 'Auf der Milch-und Honingwiese')

In Meine Fruhesten Erlebnisse (1914) Spitteler returned to his childhood. At the beginning of World War I, Spitteler urged his fellow Swiss Germans to be less pro-German, and advocated the view that Switzerland should not take sides intellectually with Germany or France. He received the Nobel Prize at the age of 75. Due to illness he was not able to attend the ceremony. Romain Rolland proclaimed him in a tribute "our Homer, the greatest German poet since Goethe". Spitteler died on December 28, 1924, in Lucerne. Spitteler's last work was Prometheus Der Builder (1924), a new and rhymed version of his first work.