Arno Schmidt was born on January 18, 1914. He was a German author and translator. He is little known outside of German-speaking areas, in part because his works present a formidable challenge to translators. Although he is not one of the popular favourites within Germany, critics and writers often consider him to be one of the most important German-language writers of the 20th century.
Born in Hamburg, the son of a police constable, Schmidt moved in 1928, after the death of his father, with his mother, to her hometown of Lauban (in Lusatia, then Lower Silesia, now Poland) and attended secondary school in Görlitz as well as a trade school there. After finishing school he was unemployed for some months and then, in 1934, began a commercial apprenticeship at a textile company in Greiffenberg. After finishing his apprenticeship he was hired by the same company as a stock accountant. Around this time, at his company, he met his future wife, Alice Murawski. The couple married on 21 August 1937; they had no children. At the outset of World War II, in 1939, Schmidt was drafted into the Wehrmacht, where his mathematical skills led him to be assigned to the artillery corps. He first served in Alsace and after 1941 in fairly quiet Norway. In 1945, Schmidt volunteered for active front duty in Northern Germany, in order to be granted a brief home visit. As the war was obviously lost, he used this visit to organise his wife's and his own escape to the west of Germany, in order to evade capture by the Red Army, which was known for its much harsher treatment of prisoners of war and German civilians. Schmidt gave himself up to British forces in Lower Saxony. As refugees, Schmidt and his wife lost almost all of their possessions, including their cherished book collection.
After an interlude as an English POW and later as an interpreter at a police school, Schmidt began his career as a freelance writer in 1946. Since Schmidt's pre-war home in Lauban was now under Polish administration, Schmidt and his wife were among the millions of refugees moved by the authorities to numerous places in what was to become West Germany. During this time of uncertainty and extreme poverty the Schmidts were sustained by CARE Packages his sister sent them from the US (his sister Lucie had emigrated to the US in 1939, together with her husband Rudy Kiesler, a Jewish German communist). Temporary accommodations led the Schmidts to Cordingen (near Bomlitz), Gau-Bickelheim, and Kastel (the latter two in the newly formed state of Rhineland-Palatinate). In Kastel, he was accused in court of blasphemy and moral subversion, then still considered a crime in some of the Catholic regions of Germany. As a result, Schmidt and his wife moved to the Protestant city of Darmstadt in Hessen, where the suit against him was dismissed. In 1958, the Schmidts moved to the small village of Bargfeld, where they were to stay for the rest of their lives, Schmidt dying in 1979, his wife Alice in 1983.
Leviathan – stories, 1949
Brand's Haide – novel, 1951
Schwarze Spiegel – novel, 1951
Aus dem Leben eines Fauns – novel, 1953
Die Umsiedler – prose studies, 1953
Das steinerne Herz – novel, 1954
Die Gelehrtenrepublik – novel, 1957
Dya na sore – dialogues, 1958
Rosen und Porree – stories, 1959
KAFF auch Mare Crisium – novel, 1960
Belphegor – dialogues, 1961
Nobodaddy's Kinder – 1963; collects Aus dem Leben eines Fauns, Brand's Haide, Schwarze Spiegel
Kühe in Halbtrauer – stories, 1964
Die Ritter vom Geist – dialogues, 1965
Trommler beim Zaren – stories, 1966
Seelandschaft mit Pocahontas – stories, 1966
Der Triton mit den Sonnenschirm – dialogues, 1969
Zettels Traum – novel, 1970
Die Schule der Atheisten – novel, 1972
Abend mit Goldrand – novel, 1975
Alexander oder, Was ist Wahrheit – stories, 1975
Julia, oder die Gemälde – novel (unfinished), 1983
Fouqué und einige seiner Zeitgenossen, biography of Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué, 1958 (2nd, extended ed. 1960)
Sitara und der Weg dorthin, biography of Karl May, 1963
The Egghead Republic – 1979 (Die Gelehrtenrepublik, trans. Michael Horovitz)
Evening Edged in Gold – 1980 (Abend mit Goldrand, trans. John E. Woods)
Scenes from the Life of a Faun – 1983 (Aus dem Leben eines Fauns, trans. John E. Woods)
Collected Early Fiction, 1949–1964, in four volumes (all trans. John E. Woods):
Radio Dialogs I – 1999 (trans. John E. Woods)
The School for Atheists – 2001 (Die Schule der Atheisten, trans. John E. Woods)
Radio Dialogs II – 2003 (trans. John E. Woods)
Bottom's Dream – 2016 (Zettels Traum, trans. John E. Woods)
Collected Novellas – 1994
Nobodaddy's Children – 1995
Two Novels (The Stony Heart & B/Moondocks) – 1997 (Das steinerne Herz & KAFF auch Mare Crisium)
As none of his works sold more than a few thousand copies (Schmidt openly admitted that he only wrote for the small handful of people who could appreciate his work), he lived in extreme poverty. During the last few years of his life, Arno Schmidt was financially supported by the philologist and writer Jan Philipp Reemtsma, the heir of the German cigarette manufacturer Philipp F. Reemtsma. Schmidt's final completed novel was Abend mit Goldrand (1975) which was praised by some critics for its verbal inventiveness, although many had a difficult time digesting the erotic themes of the book.
Dalkey Archive Press has reissued five volumes of Schmidt's work translated by John E. Woods. The series includes Collected Novellas, Collected Stories, Nobodaddy's Children, Two Novels, and most recently, Bottom’s Dream (Zettel’s Traum). The reissues were scheduled to coincide with "Rediscovering Arno Schmidt events in the US, UK, and continental Europe." The Arno Schmidt Foundation (Arno Schmidt Stiftung) in Bargfeld, sponsored by Jan Philipp Reemtsma, is publishing his complete works.
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