DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 Triumph of the Stump: German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics Marking Victories in the Midst of Physical Loss Fred Yaniga Hillsdale College Abstract: German literature is replete with woe and warfare and all-too frequent tragic endings. One unlikely literary motif reveals an unsuspected wealth of victorious, even uplifting tales from the depths of painful physical loss: amputations and prosthetics. A recent growth in literature concerning this topic has emerged in both the sociological field of Disability Studies (Grayson and Scheurer) as well as within literary studies (Engelstein’s Anxious Anatomy and Ingwersen’s “Prothesen und Cyborgs”). German literature offers countless examples of amputated or prosthetically enhanced figures within this unusual but illustrative motif. This paper focuses on three wellknown stories involving amputations and prosthetics: Adalbert von Chamisso’s Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte (1814), the Brothers Grimm fairy tale “Sechse kommen durch die ganze Welt” (1819) and Thomas Bernhard’s “Viktor Halbnarr. Ein Wintermärchen nicht für Kinder” (1966). The grotesque nature of the conspicuous injuries and their various prosthetic adaptations are leveraged through literature to elevate fragmented, incomplete human beings and even national identities by highlighting the indefatigable nature of the human spirit. Keywords: German fairy tales, prosthetics, amputations, disability studies, happy endings The canon of German literature has the reputation for being overly filled with depressing tales of woe, black stories of earnest doom and gloom, and an unending supply of depressingly tragic endings. We have all heard the complaint from students and colleagues, or perhaps we have even thought it quietly to ourselves: “Are there no happy endings in German literature? Must these stories always end so tragically? ” The reflex answer is often: “Ja, immer tragisch, 292 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 manchmal komisch-tragisch, aber meistens nur tragisch” which can be followed with enlightening platitudes like “Das Leben ist kein Ponyhof ” or “Das Glück ist nicht immer lustig.” 1 This difficult truth is enough to lead many to abandon their travels through German literature, or at very least, to view it with suspicion and perhaps even scorn. Such was the realization that inspired this paper. Although there are sufficient moments of darkness in German literature, there are also incredible moments of light, triumph and even joy. For example, German literature contains a rich collection of stories involving amputations and prosthetics which seem on point with the reputation of the “Literature of Doom and Gloom.” However, within this niche literary motif, an unsuspected wealth of victorious, even uplifting tales can be identified, and the fairy tale genre lends itself as an ideal conveyer of such tales. These stories of grotesque and painful loss, bodily fragmentation and conspicuous injury are presented not merely as personal and sometimes national tragedies, but are frequently coupled with moments of triumph and introspection about the indominable nature of the human spirit. Two of the stories presented below are classical “amputation stories”: “Sechse kommen durch die ganze Welt” from the Brothers Grimm and “Viktor Halbnarr” by Thomas Bernhard both feature leg amputees. One story, Adalbert von Chamisso’s Peter Schlemihl, is a more abstract and symbolic story of amputation, but one which illustrates the need to beware of different modes of amputation and prosthetics present throughout literature (Ingwersen 174). 2 All three of these stories can be classified as “fairy-tales”, or Märchen , although Peter Schlemihl bears the subtitle “ wundersame Geschichte ” and Thomas Bernhard pays homage to Shakespeare and Heine titling his short story “Ein Wintermärchen.” Each of these stories forces the reader to confront the ugliness of a human body physically fragmented. But the beauty of the fairy tale genre is to allow the story to grow beyond that initial handicap and rather than focus on the limitations, to celebrate the incredible power of the human soul to overcome disability. Perhaps better than any other genre, the fairy tale allows a writer and the reading audience to simultaneously recognize incompleteness in the original human form while refusing to allow that incompleteness to be understood as a compromise of basic human dignity. In an interesting extension of the amputation/ prosthetic motif, each of the fairy tale stories analyzed below has a connected historical national relevance as well in which the amputation element plays a significant role. Each of these fairy tale stories could and should also be read within their historical and political contexts. This motif then takes on a larger symbolic meaning beyond the affected individual human body, and then must be understood as a statement or plea for lamenting a national fragmentation, reconstituting or developing the DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics 293 idea of a nation, and even striving for solutions to overcome contemporary political restraints and limitations. The genre of the Märchen , therefore, allows for a uniquely powerful and even visceral illustration of both personal and national struggles while allowing for the celebration of creative and hopeful triumphs in the midst of desperate situations. When talking about bodily fragmentations and the abilities of the human spirit, we can look to philosophers throughout the ages who have agreed that the human soul is active, mobile and unrestrained by the limitations of the body. Beginning with Aristotle’s treatise “On the Soul” the philosopher takes up a question concerning the essence of the human condition and the role of the body-soul relationship. The Greeks were keenly interested in not only the relationship of the body to the soul, but particularly in how human beings can endeavor to know things about their own nature, and therefore, what comprises a human being exactly. Aristotle struggles with the question of whether the soul and the body can share a kind of unity. In concluding Book II, Chapter 1 of “On the Soul” he summarizes saying: “From this it indubitably follows that the soul is inseparable from its body” (643). For Aristotle, it is this inability to separate body and soul which maintains the ever-important “essential whatness” or essence of that body. This is central to our discussion of amputated and prosthetically enhanced bodies in German tales. For if the amputated central figures would somehow be diminished, not only in their bodily form, but in that loss also be deprived of some “essential whatness,” this exploration would be a fruitless endeavor. The amputated person would simply be less of a person condemned by this loss to be evaluated as such. But Aristotle anticipates this discussion stating with mathematical certitude in Book 1, Chapter 4: If from a number a number or a unit is subtracted, the remainder is another number; but plants and a many animals when divided continue to live, and each segment is thought to retain the same kind of soul. (638) If this principal can be applied to “plants and many animals”, the same may also be true for human beings: the amputation of one part does not diminish the “essential whatness” of that person. This, at least, was the consensus in ancient times. However, moving from antiquity into modernity we can see an evolution within the idea of this body-soul unity. René Descartes argues quite differently than Aristotle in Part IV of his Discourse on the Method of Correctly Conducting One’s Reason and Seeking Truth in Sciences (1637) that the soul is immaterial and separate from the body. What seems like a major discrepancy, and likely is for some philosophical debates (i.e. the question of the soul’s immortality), bears little consequence, however, for the particular argument 294 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 of this paper. Can the soul continue to exist within a fragmented, amputated body? Both philosophers insist in the affirmative. Might the soul actually be capable of transcending the limitations of that body? Here, too, both thinkers seem to agree. Descartes writes: “Accordingly this ‘I’, that is to say, the Soul* by which I am what I am, is entirely distinct from the body and is even easier to know than the body; and would not stop being everything it is, even if the body were not to exist” (29). Whether Aristotle is talking about the soul as an “essential whatness” of a being, or Descartes is discussing a soul as separate from the body but essential for the existence of the “I,” there no doubt that both thinkers see the soul not only as active, mobile and necessary for human flourishing, but furthermore completely capable of overcoming physical limitations and handicaps. Stefani Engelstein tracks the development of this argument into the 18 th and 19 th centuries by reviewing scientific work being done on epigenesis and regeneration with plants and animals in those centuries. In her 2008 book Anxious Anatomy Engelstein applied theories from that time to literary narratives of E.T.A. Hoffmann and others . Quoting widely from early naturalists’ studies, she describes theoretical attempts to understand how certain plant and animal organisms possessed regenerative power not only to heal, but also to regrow lost limbs and avoid death (153). Living bodies, so one of these theories, intrinsically know their natural form and attempt to regain or replace this form by means of epigenesis (154). Engelstein suggests that E.T.A. Hoffmann borrowed the name for his mad-scientist professor figure Spallanzani in Der Sandmann from one of these 19 th century naturalist theoreticians, Lazzaro Spallanzani who worked exhaustingly on epigenesis in snails (158). With humans, application of this epigenetic theory directly would run into obvious limitations. While healing is commonly seen in humans, the regrowth of limbs would be more than unusual. Engelstein endeavors to overcome these biological limitations by introducing Donna Haraway’s 1985 essay “A Cyborg Manifesto.” This combination of human organisms with natural and mechanical elements certainly works to accommodate the human longing to regain a semblance of the original, natural, and organic form, albeit with the help of prosthetic enhancements rather than epigenetic regrowth. Still, the idea that amputations in our human literary figures might provoke some kind of enhancement of the soul remains, at this point, a mystery. Returning to Aristotle’s basic idea that “the essential whatness” of a being remains despite the negation of a singular part, and viewing this together with observations made from several examples of “amputation literature” may get us closer to a solution. There is frequently evidence within these amputation events, not only of a continuation of soulful presence in the body, but in spe- DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics 295 cific and extraordinary examples, a clear demonstration of magnification of the human soul in the remainder of that amputated body . The stories presented here briefly, are examples of that triumphant magnification of soul within, or perhaps because of, the amputated body. Colleagues in Sociology and those working within the area of Disability Studies have already developed this idea extensively. Erik Grayson and Maren Scheuer have published a collection of essays entitled Amputation in Literature and Film (2021) which challenge the normal perception of people living with the pain and loss of amputations. In their book, examples of capable, athletic and even sensually alluring prosthesis wearers come to the fore. In the fields of Cultural Studies and Technology Studies, the topic has been taken up with terms such as “cybernetics” and the question of the “posthuman” condition (Hayles). Katherine Hayles envisions this condition as one which can be liberating and humanizing in unique and novel achievement. Sigmund Freud in his 1930 work Das Unbehagen in der Kultur introduces the concept of “Der Prothesengott” in which human beings, through an indirect, non-connected interface with their environment, are able to “put on accessory organs” (Freud) to achieve “Märchenwünsche” - “fairy-tale desires.” These achievements must not always be understood in terms of Haraway’s Cyborgs or even Freud’s “Prothesengott.” Quite simply, we might take Aristotle at his word and understand that there is more there than is visibly there when it comes to human beings. When read with this focus, these German fairy tales, built around amputation and prosthetically completed characters, highlight this special interplay of the human body and soul. This highlight is not only strangely intriguing, but certainly also inspiring. Adding to the personal stories of overcoming handicap and loss, these stories also add something to the abstract discussion surrounding the national-historic context of their times. Each tale, in its own way, comments on historic national context of Germany and Austria in their various stages of building and refiguring the national psyche. The argument could be made then, that these tales offer both personal moments of triumph over difficulty alongside national moments of memory which provide soothing for frustration, fragmentation and loss and may even merit that long sought-after “happy end” status. In the second edition of the Grimm’s Kinder- und Hausmärchen (1819) we find included the tale of a soldier and his band of misfits who outsmart a king and wager their way to unlikely riches. We meet this soldier just as he has been denied his just wages following the cessation of fighting. He vows to return to the king and demand his payment once he gathers the right fighters around him. First, he finds a man in the forest so strong that he can pull entire trees out of the ground. Next, he adds to the troop a hunter who can shoot out the eye 296 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 of a fly from two miles away. Later, he comes across a man who can blow hard enough through one nostril to turn a windmill. Finally, our soldier secures for his team a runner who proudly introduces himself: Ich bin ein Läufer, und damit ich nicht zu schnell springe, habe ich mir das eine Bein abgeschnallt. Wenn ich mit zwei Beinen laufe, so geht’s geschwinder, als ein Vogel fliegt. (Grimm 370—371) For our purposes, it is this fantastic runner with the detachable prosthetic leg who is our centerpiece, but needless to say, each of the named “misfits” has an important role to play in the story. In true fairy tale fashion, the king has offered the hand of his daughter in marriage for the first man who can beat her in a foot race. Our runner straps on his prosthetic leg and leads the race easily from the outset. But of course, as this is a fairy tale, he stops midway for a short nap. Shortly thereafter, the king’s daughter passes him by laughing at his stupidity. Noticing the dilemma through his powerful scope, the hunter shoots the horse-skull pillow out from under the runner’s head to wake him, and, once again on his feet, the runner easily wins the race with ten minutes to spare. At the end of the day, the soldier and his band of misfits carry off the collected wealth of the entire kingdom. Despite the king’s best efforts, there is nothing he can do to stop them: They have beaten him fair and square and have outthought him at every turn. With great exasperation the king finally declares: “Laßt die Kerle gehen, die haben etwas an sich” (375). And truly there is somethings special about them, for, even in their seemingly outward awkwardness, incompleteness and handicap, they demonstrate that indominable spirit, Aristotle’s “essential whatness” of a human being, which allows them to triumph over seemingly impossible challenges. What is perhaps just as interesting as this simple “amputation story” itself is the Nachleben , or afterlife, of the story. This widely popular Grimm story has been understandably adapted many times over. Popular screen adaptations (Simon 1972 and Janson 2014), however, attempt to make it more palatable by removing the amputee from the story. Instead of the grotesquely fragmented body with its disturbing prosthetic replacement, modern interpreters have given the runner an iron boot (Simon 1972) or an anchor-laden backpack ( Janson 2014) to slow down his running. Many Grimm fairy-tales have been edited for commercial purposes or to appear less objectionable, thus compromising their original “Grimmness” (Zipes). Here especially, the runner’s amputated and fragmented body are absolutely necessary for a complete demonstration of the “triumph of the stump.” What might be seen as a harmless alteration might also rightly be criticized as a wrong-headed and poorly understood interpretation. For to DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics 297 remove the amputee and his particular handicap (a fragmented body) diminishes the Aristotelian power of the soul, if you will, to re-organize the organism and transform what might be easily be viewed as a lack, a deformity, “eine Missbildung” into the central element of victory over mundane and passive completeness. Contemporary polite society harbors a fear of or even pointed revulsion when confronted with the fragmented body. Censors and well-meaning interpreters should, however, consider preserving one of the Grimm Brothers’ original intentions in this amputation story. As the soldier says as he adds each new member to his team: “Wenn wir sechs zusammen sind, sollten wir wohl durch die ganze Welt kommen” (370). If the lessons of solidarity and resiliency of the human spirit are be taught and learned, they require their original form, even if that original form is an amputated stump. 3 The Brothers Grimm allow the soldier’s prosaic fairy tale declaration at the end of “Sechse kommen durch die ganze Welt” to comment not only on the overcoming of individual, personal handicap, but perhaps to bear simultaneously a deeper national commentary as well. At the time of the publication of the Kinder- und Hausmärchen , the German nation was merely a dream. With the Napoleonic occupation of German lands only recently ended, and nationhood still decades away, the Grimms were gathering stories meant to inspire Germans to believe in exactly the kind of solidarity, unity and indominable spirit which the soldier proclaims at the end of the fairy tale. The use of a runner with a prosthetic leg surrounded by a mighty team of triumphant misfits seems to fit this narrative quite well. Just five years before the first publication of “Sechse kommen durch die ganze Welt,” Adalbert von Chamisso, a refugee from the French Revolution, published his well-known novella, Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte (1814) . In this fantastic adventure, our title figure Peter Schlemihl endures a rough sea voyage in order to meet and do business with a certain Mr. Thomas John. When he finally locates Mr. John, he finds him in the countryside accompanied by a small party of merry-makers. With them there is a quiet, inconspicuous “grey man” who, quite magically, is able to produce from his coat pockets everything that John demands: bandages for a cut finger, a telescope, food and drink, even expensive Turkish carpets are produced. Upon request, and without raising a comment, the grey man finally brings out a tent, and even three horses complete with saddles and harnesses: Mir war schon lang unheimlich, ja graulich zumute; wie ward mir vollends, als beim nächst ausgesprochenen Wunsch ich ihn noch aus seiner Tasche drei Reitpferde, ich sage dir, drei schöne, große Rappen mit Sattel und Zeug herausziehen sah! (26) 298 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 None of the guests pay the grey man any attention, and Peter Schlemihl, a complete outsider in this party, finds himself alone with man who begins to converse with him: Während der kurzen Zeit, wo ich das Glück genoß, mich in Ihrer Nähe zu befinden, habe ich, mein Herr, einige Male - erlauben Sie, daß ich es Ihnen sage - wirklich mit unaussprechlicher Bewunderung den schönen, schönen Schatten betrachten können, den Sie in der Sonne und gleichsam mit einer gewissen edlen Verachtung, ohne selbst darauf zu merken, von sich werfen, den herrlichen Schatten da zu Ihren Füßen. (28) The grey man admires Schlemihl’s shadow, and the Faustian bargain ensues. Schlemihl agrees to sell his shadow in exchange for a magical sack, the famous “Fortunati Glücksäckel,” from which an endless supply of gold coins can be taken at will. Topp! Der Handel gilt; für den Beutel haben Sie meinen Schatten. Er schlug ein, kniete dann ungesäumt vor mir nieder, und mit einer bewundernswürdigen Geschicklichkeit sah ich ihn meinen Schatten vom Kopf bis zu meinen Füssen leise von dem Grase lösen, aufheben, zusammenrollen und falten und zuletzt einstecken. (29) What follows this “shadow-ectomy” is the tragic tale of Peter Schlemihl trying and failing to make his way through the world, but now without the help of his shadow. Immediately he encounters an old woman on the road who yells to him: “Watch out, Sir, you have lost your shadow” (24), and a group of street kids begin throwing clods of manure at him yelling: “Ordentliche Leute pflegen ihren Schatten mit sich zu nehmen, wenn sie in die Sonne gingen” (24). In order to distract these detractors, Schlemihl throws gold coins at them and flees into an elegant hotel, which, luckily enough, faces north and assists him in avoiding the sun. But no matter what he tries, going out only at night, keeping to the indoors, even hiring an artist to paint him a new shadow, all of these attempts fall short and he is again and again exposed as being an incomplete human being, missing his shadow and therefore cursed to live his life as a lowly and sorrowful, albeit wealthy, amputee. The grey man returns later and offers Schlemihl the return of his shadow in exchange for his soul. 4 Schlemihl declines the offer: Ich will Ihnen auch weiter nichts von meinem Habe verkaufen, sei es auch um den angebotenen Preis meines Schattens, und unterschreibe also nichts. Daraus läßt sich auch abnehmen, daß die Verkappung, zu der Sie mich einladen, ungleich belustigender für Sie als für mich ausfallen müßte; halten Sie mich also für entschuldigt, und da es einmal nicht anders ist - laßt uns scheiden! (52) DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics 299 This turns out to be the wisest decision Schlemihl makes throughout the entire story. Only a short time later the grey man appears again to torment our friend even more. Schlemihl inquires about Sir Thomas John, and the grey man begins laughing, and reaching into his bag, pulls out by the hair, none other than the blue-lipped form of Sir Thomas John who speaks as from the depths of hell: “Justo judicio Dei judicatus sum; justo judicio Dei condemnatus sum.” (68) - “I have been judged and condemned by the just judgement of God.” Schlemihl has avoided eternal damnation, but his disfigurement has nonetheless condemned him to a life apart from polite society. Schlemihl wears out his boots wandering aimlessly, mostly at night. He decides to buy a used pair of boots at a church festival market, and this is where his luck takes a fortunate turn. These boots prove to be seven-league boots, an orthotic footwear that allows him to pursue a new life of intense and accelerated botanical studies. Striding faster than lightening around the globe, Schlemihl is overjoyed by his new life as a solitary botanist until one day he is surprised by a polar bear, falls into freezing water, and catches a deadly cold. He is just barely able to save himself and wakes up in a hospital which bears his very name: “ SCHLEMIHLIUM ” the sign in the recovery hall reads. No one recognizes him because of his long beard and strange clothes. They actually mistake him for a wandering Jew. But it seems that his old friends, using his long since abandoned money, have opened a charity hospital for the poor in his name. The patients are even reminded, by means of another sign hanging in the recovery room, to pray for the initiator and benefactor of the hospital, Peter Schlemihl (76). Clearly, this is a different kind of “amputation-story.” Moritz Ingwersen, in his 2020 book Behinderung, argues that prosthetics must be understood not only as materially attached technologies, but as cultural metaphors which are simultaneously constructions of identity (74). This story hints at the feelings of displacement and fragmentation of identity from which Chamisso himself certainly suffered as a transplanted refugee in German lands. It symbolically takes on the message of an amputated identity and the attempt to restore to completeness that fragmented human nature with the help of a prosthetic identity (wandering botanist) and a prosthetic orthotic device (seven-league boots). We cannot help but think that a story of symbolic and allegorical amputation such as this must have special meaning among a people historically so divided, politically carved up, and tragically separated as the German people have been throughout the centuries. At very least, Chamisso provides a truly German “Happy-End” to this “wundersame Geschichte” - Schlemihl recovers fully and again takes up his very productive scientific studies promising to donate his Latin manuscripts to the Berlin University before his death (79). Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte is a story of an amputated identity completed with 300 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 the help of prosthetics and even magnified in fulfillment by the experience and overcoming of bodily fragmentation. Until now this essay has regarded literary examples from the 19 th century which include both a classical Grimm fairy tale and a novella written as a kind of Kunstmärchen . Before crossing into the 20 th century with Thomas Bernhard’s self-proclaimed “Wintermärchen,” it might be worthwhile to consider why the fairy tale genre is so effective in presenting these very challenging stories to a reading audience. The fairy tale genre clearly gives the writer the opportunity to present the unpresentable in literary form. This means that ideas which would otherwise be unacceptable due to social mores, political realities, religious taboos, etc., now have a field in which the reader is able to access them and engage more freely and without threat of direct repression. This brief literary suspension of disbelief, however, provides a powerful opportunity for new ideas to be tried out, and, if found fruitful, to grow and expand. The idea that an amputee could make a useful contribution to a military team (“Sechse kommen durch die Welt”) or that a man deprived of his shadow might derive life-fulfilling assistance from prosthetic seven-league boots is revolutionary. But the fact is, there are thousands of readers suffering very real disabilities who can take inspiration and hope from these uplifting stories. The fairy tale makes possible what the real world often rejects or derides. The triumph of the stump, then, comes when real people can engage with these tales and gain for themselves the hope that they need to carry themselves beyond their disability and into a productive new life. Thomas Bernhard’s moving little tale “Viktor Halbnarr” features just such a hero. First published in 1966 in a volume entitled Dichter erzählen Kindern and then again later in his 1979 collection Erzählungen , Bernhard directs our attention from the very start to the significance of the genre. By subtitling “Viktor Halbnarr” as “Ein Wintermärchen” he echoes Heinrich Heine’s satirical epic poem “Deutschland. Ein Wintermärchen,” and perhaps even Shakespeare’s problem play with a happy ending, The Winter’s Tale . By consciously making these connections, Bernhard is engaging with a corpus of literature which considers both the political and real-world ramifications of storytelling. These literary texts are not simply written and read and left to rot in the forgotten libraries of time. They are picked up later, strapped on by others, put to work for new readers and writers and over time they can accumulate potency and new potential. Bernhard’s bizarre tale features a legless protagonist “Viktor” who straps on his prosthetic wooden legs and takes on a ludicrous 800 Schilling bet with a local mill owner. The bet is that he, Viktor, could traverse the high forest DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics 301 road between the alpine towns of Traich and Föding. It is dark and snowing, and still, Viktor insists that he undertake the journey and, hopefully, will arrive at the doors of the church in Traich before the stroke of midnight (91, 93). This is no easy journey, even for a person with legs. Bernhard tells us this through his narrator and second figure in the story, the doctor, who is making a similar journey that night. The doctor is on his way from Traich to Föding to visit a sick patient. The narrating doctor calls the high forest road between Traich and Föding “tödlich” - deadly, even for the healthiest of travelers (91). Halbnarr has forgotten about his handicap in the heat of the bet, but this does not change the fact that he lost those legs eight years ago in a train accident. Now, he has fallen and broken both prosthetic wooden legs in the midst of this foolish journey: “Ich habe auf einmal vergessen, dass ich Holzbeine habe, keine eigenen, ich habe geglaubt, dass ich wieder eigene Beine habe! ” (91). Like the Good Samaritan in St. Luke’s gospel (Luke 10, 25—37), the doctor, who literally stumbles over the prone amputee while making his sick visit (90) takes pity and helps the crippled man, thus saving him from a certain and miserable death in the snow. In the course of carrying Halbnarr, and the doctor does not fail to comment on the irony of the name - “man denke, er hieß Halbnarr! ” (91) - the doctor hears of why the man would undertake such a ridiculous challenge. Halbnarr tells him, that even though he did not believe himself that he could accomplish the feat, he took on the bet “weil man ja nichts unversucht, keine gute Gelegenheit, sich zu verbessern, ungenützt vorbeigehen lassen solle” (92). Halbnarr, for his part, while lamenting the loss of the bet, rejoices in beating death, and does not himself miss the irony of being saved by a doctor, “von einem Vertretter der Hohen Medizin” (93). As if this miraculous deliverance were not enough, Bernhard has his doctor-narrator carry the legless Halbnarr, splintered wooden legs and all, through the snow and the dark of night, so efficiently and quickly that they arrive at the church in Föding at exactly the stroke of midnight. The mill owner is there and with no small amount of disappointment, pays out eight one-hundred Schilling notes, grumbling all the while - “gewettet ist gewettet” (94). The doctor then carries Halbnarr to the nearby inn and pays in advance for a bed for the night. On their parting, Halbnarr tells the doctor that he plans to use the 800 Schilling to buy a pair of leather boots (94). Indeed, he won the bet, but lost his prosthetic legs which cost him 2000 Schilling. And the doctor leaves thinking: “Was für ein Mensch. […] Ist der verrückt? ” (95). This fantastic story of Viktor Halbnarr would not be a true fairy tale without an imaginative ending in which children of every age must take delight - and for this they would not even need an understanding of the ironical allusions to Heine or the gospel story at all. Thomas Bernhard is clearly up to the task 302 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 here. The key to understanding the story more fully, however, lays not in the confounding ending, but in the beginning. At the start of the tale, our doctor is particularly perplexed and frustrated, commenting that his patient suffers from a horrific “Kopfkrankheit” which is known in medical books, but for which no one has determined the causes (90). This tragic reality leads our good doctor into a state of malaise and helplessness which he blames further on his own “Vorliebe für das Nichtstun” (90). The fact that he stumbles upon and is able to help the doomed Halbnarr, raises his spirits and lends him the energy and purpose which he had lacked heretofore. What for Halbnarr, and perhaps even for the doctor’s hopeless patient, was a nonsensical journey, is indeed a very meaningful and life-affirming encounter for our Good Samaritan doctor. Those horrific and seemingly senseless amputations suffered eight years previous become the motivator for a courageous (albeit foolish) act by Viktor, and a selfless and heroic act by the doctor. Like both “Sechse kommen durch die ganze Welt” and Peter Schlemihl , Bernhard’s winter tale of “Viktor Halbnarr” and his prosthetic adventures serves a double purpose. On the one hand, Viktor (the ironic victor of the tale) emerges triumphant despite his physical handicap. On the other, Viktor could also be seen as a symbol of modern Austria. The depiction of this country limping and dragging itself out of the wreckage of two 20 th century wars is powerful. The devastation of war has left the nation physically amputated, reduced in size and status. And spiritually, any mid-century Austrian certainly faced questions about what “Austria” even means now in this new historic reality. There is no author better than Thomas Bernhard at throwing the ugliness of that Austrian situation right into the reader’s face: this once great empire has fallen, has been duped and has acted stupidly to the point of losing almost everything. And yet there is hope, and that hope emerges in the darkest, coldest most truly Austrian setting possible. 5 What is the meaning and purpose of literature if not to develop our minds and improve our hearts? Franz Kafka tells us: “Ein Buch muss die Axt sein für das gefrorene Meer in uns.” These amputation stories will certainly have the effect of Kafka’s axe on many readers. We are often shaken, frightened and maybe even disgusted at the sight of physical deformity, the gruesome depiction of fragmented limbs and awkward prostheses. These stories force us to look at the ugliness of an amputated stump and yet recognize the dignity and complete humanity of persons in these bodies making their way through the world. These stories have the power to engage our imagination and offer hopeful solutions not only to individuals, but in some contexts, even to wider national audiences as well. The possibility of the human soul extending beyond and overcoming the DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 German Stories of Amputations and Prosthetics 303 limitations of a misfortune, a handicap or disability is more than inspirational, it gives hope for not only the physically challenged, but for others with less obvious handicaps as well. The coupling of biological reality with mechanical ingenuity bears testimony to both an innate human recognition of original form and a longing to strive beyond the limitations of that form. Others will expand this idea to challenge the historic and traditional concepts of the ideal human form and how this ideal is being changed and even surpassed. Most importantly for the purposes of this essay is to demonstrate that stories like these can lead us to greater human empathy with those who have suffered, who have been fragmented and physically damaged, and stories like these must certainly have a place in our curriculum. They can also help us shed light on difficult historical realities which bear their own psychological difficulties not only on a personal level, but often on a national level as well. These amputation stories rise to highlight moments of human courage, creativity and that indominable Aristotelian spirit which return joy to our discipline by truly allowing us to celebrate the triumph of the stump. Notes 1 The opening dedication to Werner Fassbinder’s 1974 film Ali. Angst essen Seele auf . 2 Ingwersen states: “Für einen kulturwissenschaftlichen Zugang zum Phänomen Behinderung ist es unausweichlich, die Prothese gleichzeitig als am Körper materialisierte Technologie wie auch als produktive kulturelle Metapher zu verstehen” (74). Chamisso’s use of Peter Schlemihl‘s amputated shadow and procurement of prosthetic-like seven-league boots seem to fit this cultural metaphor perfectly. 3 An example of this in the positive would be the widley publicized announcement from The European Space Agency (ESA) that John McFall, a British surgeon with a prosthetic leg would become the first ever “Parastronaut” travelling to the International Space Station in an upcoming mission. 4 Goethe’s Faust had been published in 1808, only six years earlier, and there are many indications that Chamisso was reading Faust as he wrote Schlemihl. 5 While the references to Heine’s “Wintermärchen” and Shakespeare’s “A Winter’s Tale” have already been made, we might here also think about Bernhard’s clear reference to Adalbert Stifter’s “Bergkristall” with all its fierce winter-time destructive beauty and Christian imagery mixed in. 304 Fred Yaniga DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0018 Works Cited Aristotle. 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