My Life and My Efforts Part 12

But even more valuable to me than this punctuality was the fact that all of my ma.n.u.scripts were ordered in advance and would surely be accepted and printed. This enabled me to, now finally, carry out my plans concerning my "traveller's tales". Now, I could be sure to have the necessary s.p.a.ce in a magazine for a long time to come at my disposal. Who would later publish these tales in the form of books, was a question which might just as well remain unanswered for the time being. There are hostile people who have said that I had only sought contact with this Catholic publisher for the sake of money. This is such an unconscientious and reprehensible lie that I cannot find the words to answer it.

I have done the very opposite of what I am here accused of. I have made sacrifices for the "Deutscher Hausschatz" and its publisher, the extent of which the Pustet family did not even suspect. Before me, I have a letter which Professor Josef Kurschner, the well known, famous publicist, I used to be a very close friend of, has written to me on October the 3th, 1886. He was writing about the magazine "Vom Fels zum Meere" , which was published by Spemann in Stuttgart and for which I used to work. The letter reads as follows:

"Dear Sir!

"In the meantime, you have once again supplied other companies with material, while you are still keeping me waiting for what you have already promised a long time ago. This is not exactly the right thing to do, and I am asking you urgently to make good on your promise to me, now. I do not want to miss this opportunity to ask you, whether you would not be inclined to start writing a rather thrilling, gripping, and eventful novel. In this case, I would be able to guarantee YOU royalties of up to a thousand marks per sheet of the magazine, if you would write something of the kind.

"Most sincerely your most devoted Josef Kurschner."

The royalties I received from Pustet were, compared with these thousand marks, so insignificant that I cannot bring myself to naming the amount here. The fact that I nevertheless preferred Pustet is surely more than a sufficient proof that I did not write for the "Hausschatz" to "make more money than I received from others". My other publishers also payed significantly more than Pustet. I hereby have to state this for a fact, to confront these vicious rumours. I will tell you about the contents of these tales I wrote for the "Hausschatz" elsewhere. Obeying the logic of the facts, I have have to turn from Pustet back to Munchmeyer.

The year was 1882, when I reached Dresden with my wife on a recreational trip. I had described Munchmeyer thus vividly to her, that she could picture him quite correctly, though she had not seen him yet. But she wished very much to get to know him, the man about whom others had told her as well that he was a handsome fellow, a splendid conversationalist, and felt enthusiastically about beautiful women. At this time of the year, he was in the habit of frequenting a certain garden restaurant at nightfall. When I told her about this, she asked me to escort her there. I did so, though I felt reluctant about showing him the one I had preferred over his sister-in-law. I was not mistaken.

He was there. The only guest in the entire garden. His joy to see me gain was sincere; this was plain to see. But might there not also have been reasons relating to his business for this joy?

He had been sitting there so very much slouching and depressed, with his head in both of his hands. But now, he was suddenly happy and alert. He was radiating with pleasure. In his colportage-style, he gave me the most impossible compliments, for having such a beautiful wife, and he congratulated my wife in the same expressions for the good fortune of having a husband who had become famous so quickly. He knew my success, but exaggerated it, to flatter the two of us. He impressed my wife, and she impressed him just the same. He began to talk enthusiastically, and he began to become honest. He told her that she was as beautiful as an angel, and that she was to be his rescuing angel, yes, his rescuing angel whom he needed in this present dire need. She could save him by asking me to write a novel for him. And now he told his story:

After I had left his business, he had not found a suitable editor for the magazines I had founded. He himself had no gift for editing. They very quickly lost in value; the subscribers cancelled; they were discontinued. But this was not all.

Nothing at all seemed to work out for him. One loss followed after another, and now, the situation was thus that he could no longer evade Hamlet's question of "to be or not to be". Just in this very moment, he had pondered the matter by whom or what he could be saved, but in vain. Then, the two of us had come in, like being heaven-sent. And now he knew, that he would be saved, saved by me, by a novel of mine, by the beautiful, young, kind woman of my heart, who would not leave me alone with this matter, until the novel was in his hands. This sly fellow had, by means of this crude praise, completely a.s.sured himself of my inexperienced wife's a.s.sistance. He urged me to fulfil his wish, and she joined in. He was clever enough to suggest to me that basically it was only me who was to blame for his present bad situation. Six years ago, everything had been extraordinary well; but when I refused to marry his sister-in-law and left my job as an editor, everything had turned completely into the opposite. To undo this damage, he said, I was morally practically obliged, to give him a hand, now.

As far as this final thought was concerned, I felt very well that there was some truth in it. My willingness to marry the sister of Mrs. Munchmeyer had, at that time, been taken so much for granted, that they were talking about it everywhere. By rejecting this plan, not just this girl, but the entire family as well, had suffered an almost public humiliation, which, though it was not my fault, moved me to do Munchmeyer some kind of a favour to repair the damage. Furthermore, there had been no argument between us, but we had parted as friends. So there could be no personal reason, only perhaps one relating to business, to reject his wish.

But concerning business, there also was no compelling reason to refuse. I had time; I just had to take it. The fact that Munchmeyer published colportage did not compel me to write for him nothing but a trashy colportage-novel. It could be something better, an evolving sequence of traveller's tales, as I delivered to Pustet and other publishers. If I did so, this would at the same time serve my life's work as well, and just it had been planned for the Hausschatz-tales, I could, what I wrote for Munchmeyer, also have published in books later on for my own benefit.

These ideas went through my head, while Munchmeyer and my wife were trying to persuade me. I finally declared that I might perhaps decide to write the desired novel, but only under the condition that after an appointed time, all right would revert to me. Absolutely no word was allowed to be changed from my ma.n.u.script; but, after all, he would know about this from my previous work, I said. Munchmeyer stated that he would agree to this, but I should not be too hard on him concerning the royalties. He was in need and could not pay much. Later, if my novel should turn out to be a success, he could balance this out with a "fine gratification". This sounded not too bad. He asked me not to impose a time, when the novel should revert to me, but rather to agree on a number of subscribers; once this would have been reached, he would have to stop and return my rights to me.

He figured out that with six to seven thousand subscribers, he would break even; everything beyond this was profit. Therefore, I suggested that, in case I should write this novel, Munchmeyer should be allowed to sell up to twenty thousand subscriptions, not more; then, he would have to pay me a "fine gratification", and all of the rights to the novel would revert to me. Whether I would then, for appropriate royalties, continue having it published with him or another publisher, was entirely up to me.

Munchmeyer immediately agreed to this, but did not definitely consent yet; I declared that I wanted to think about the matter thoroughly and give him my decision the next day.

As early as the next morning, Munchmeyer came to our hotel, to get my decision. I said yes, to equal parts voluntarily and forced.

My wife had been keeping at it, until I had given her the promise to fulfil his wish. He got the novel at the desired conditions, which was only up to the twenty thousandth subscriber. For this, he had to pay 35 marks per issue and a "fine gratification" in the end. We shook hands. Thus, our contract was not in writing, but an oral agreement. He said that we were both honest men and would never cheat one another. It would sound like an insult to him to ask him for a signature. I had two good reasons for agreeing to this. The first one was that, according to the Saxonian law at that time, only a thousand copies were allowed to be printed without a contract; thus, Munchmeyer would have only defrauded himself, if he had intended to be dishonest; so I thought. And secondly, I could easily and inconspicuously obtain the missing written contract by means of letters. I, quite simply, only had to style my business letters to Munchmeyer in such a way, that his answers, in one letter after another, would contain everything we had agreed upon. And so I did, safely keeping all of his answers.

He was very eager that I should start with the novel right away.

I did him this favour and quickly returned to Hohenstein, to start without delay. My wife urged me almost even more than Munchmeyer himself. He had a personal preference for the meaningless t.i.tle "Das Waldroschen" [a]. I agreed to this as well, but was careful not to make any further kinds of concessions to him. After just a few weeks, there were good news.

The novel "went". This "went" is a term of the business, which means a not too commonplace success. I received no proof-sheets for correction or revision, and this was just all right with me, because I had no time for this. Copies of the finished booklets were not sent to me, because they would have interrupted my concentration. I was to receive my free copies after the novel was finished in one complete set. I agreed to this. Of course, this gave me no opportunity to compare my original ma.n.u.script with the printed text, but I did not worry about this. After all, we had agreed that no word of mine was to be changed, and I was so trusting in those days to think that this was enough.

[a] An English translation was published in 1886 under the t.i.tle "Rosita" in America.

The success of the "Waldroschen" did not just seem to turn out well, but even quite extraordinarily. Munchmeyer wrote in his letters that he was very satisfied. He repeatedly wrote that he considered himself to be saved even now, after such a short time, for he did hope that the novel would continue to attract as many readers as it had up to now. He suggested that we should not stay in Hohenstein, but move to Dresden, since he wanted me to be near him. My wife enthusiastically jumped on the idea and made sure that it was carried out as quickly as possible. By no means, I offered any resistance. Especially since during my time in Hohenstein, I had to think more and more often of the warning, which was to be read in the Bible teacher's book. In spite of this warning, I had not just settled down at the place of my birth, but had also taken a wife from there. For some time, I had tended towards regarding the contents of this pa.s.sage of the book as a superst.i.tion, but soon afterwards, I regarded it again with the eyes of an psychologist and was finally, by the weight of the facts, forced to realize that a single swimmer can at any rate cross muddy waters easier than when he has to take a second person along who can neither swim nor is willing to swim. Therefore, this move was rather what I had wanted, and yet, as a matter of caution, I did not move to Dresden itself, but rather to Blasewitz, to have more freedom. Even there, Munchmeyer called on me right away, and repeated his visits several time a week. A contact developed between him and us, which was quite advantageous in the beginning. I worked to hard that I did almost never permitted myself to relax. This novel progressed very rapidly, and its success grew to such an extent that Munchmeyer asked me to write a second one and possibly even several more. I did not suspect that my decision concerning this wish of his would be a highly important one for me and that a positive answer could become a source of unspeakable misery and unp.r.o.nounceable torture for me. I only looked at the alleged advantages, but did not see the danger.

This danger developed, as it did once before, out of my literary plans. Munchmeyer had not forgotten these plans; he still knew them very well. Now, he reminded me of them. Because I had given up my job in his business, I had not been able to carry them out, then. But now, I was no employee, but a free man, who could not be kept from doing as he pleased by anything. And the most important thing was: I did not need to stretch what I wanted to write, as I had to do with Pustet, over many annual sets of a magazine, but I could swiftly write it all, one thing after another, to publish what was now printed in booklets, later, in the form of books. This enticed me. On top of it, there was the constant insistence of my wife, who could very easily silence the minor objections I had to make. In short, I gave my consent to write several novels more and this at the very same conditions as the "Waldroschen". So, these works also had to revert to me after the twenty thousandth subscriber with all rights included, and then, I was to payed a "fine gratification". There was just a single change, and this was that I received royalties of fifty marks per booklet for these novels, instead of just thirty-five for the "Waldroschen".

Due to this agreement, this was the beginning of a time for me, of which I cannot think today without satisfaction, but also not without a feeling of deep shame. I am not asking, whether I am hurting my reputation by being thus honest; it is my duty to say the truth, nothing else. At this time, I worked with an almost feverish zeal. I did not have to spent much effort on looking for topics like other authors; after all, I had made extensive lists of topics for myself, I only had to turn to, to instantly find what I was looking for. And all of them were already completely thought out; I only had to carry them out; I only needed to write. And I did the latter with an eagerness, which did not let me look either left or right, and this in particular, this was the very thing I wanted. I had to realize that there was no other happiness for me in life than only this one, which was derived from my work. Therefore, I worked, I worked so much and with so much pleasure, so much pleasure! This restless zeal enabled me to forget that I had been mistaken concerning my life's bliss and was now leading an even much, much lonelier life than ever before.

This deep, internal loneliness urged me to be restlessly busy, to fill the dreary desolation, and it unfortunately made me indifferent in respect to the necessity of having to be cautious in matters of business. In Munchmeyer's company, so many things happened which might have caused me to be vigilant, so that I had more than a sufficient reason to ensure as much as possible the future accessibility and integrity of everything I wrote for him.

Not thinking of this was a mistake, which I can excuse, but cannot forgive myself for, even up to this day.

Munchmeyer had become a regular caller of ours. In Blasewitz, he had rented some kind of a bachelor's apartment, to be able to spent his Sat.u.r.days and Sundays more comfortably with us. He also came in the evenings of other days, and almost always, he brought his brother along and very often other persons as well. Though he wished that, by no means, I should allow this to disturb me in my work, he could not keep me from being the master of my apartment, and then, when this had become impossible to me, I did not hesitate to give the apartment up and to move away from Blasewitz, to the city. My new apartment was in one of the most quiet and most remote streets, and my new landlord, a very forceful owner of a castle and a manorial estate, did not permit any disturbing noise and generally nothing he deemed unnecessary in his house.

This was the very thing I had been looking for. There, I found the internal and external quiet and concentration I needed.

Munchmeyer came a few more time, than he stayed away. Instead, I do not know why, we received invitations from Mrs. Munchmeyer, to accompany her on her Sunday walks through the forest and the heath. She had been advised to take these walks by a physician, who had prescribed deep breaths of fresh air for her. Whether I liked it or not, I had to take part in them, because this was my wife's wish, whose reasons I unfortunately was unable to appreciate. She did not get used to the seclusiveness of our present apartment; she got into an argument with the landlord. I had to terminate the lease. We moved out, to a noisy apartment of the American quarter, which was right above a public bar, so that I could not work. Then, she became ill. The physician advised her to take very early walks in the "Large Garden", the world-famous park of Dresden. Such prescriptions of a physician have to be obeyed. I had no reason to prevent these walks, which started between four and five o'clock in the morning and lasted for about three hours. I did not know that Mrs. Munchmeyer had also been ill and that she, too, had been instructed by her physician to go on early morning walks in the "Large Garden".

Only after a long, very long time, I found out what had happened during those walks. I had not just lost touch with my wife's soul, but I had also lost her in business matters. Every day, early in the morning, the two ladies sat together in a cafe of the "Large Garden" and practised a kind of housewife's business politics, the effects of which I did not get to feel until much later. I put an end to it and moved away from Dresden, to Kotzschenbroda, the outermost point of the periphery of Dresden's suburbs.

Even before this, I had managed to finish my last novel for Munchmeyer. I had written five of them for him, in a time of only four years. In regard to the later allegations in court that I had not been working hard for Munchmeyer, but had been lazy, just name me an author who has coped with a larger workload and has, at the same time, been working for other publishers as well. With this, let me put an end to my "time at the colportage" for today.

VII. My Literary Work

When I am talking about my literary work here, I am referring to those books the critics have been or still are devoting their attention to. Those books the critics have ignored, no matter whether it happened intentionally or unintentionally, may also be skipped here. Among these are my humorous short stories, my village-tales from the Ore Mountains, and a few other things which still lie hidden in the newspapers, without being collected in books. I could also list my "Thoughts of Heaven" among those, since no critic seems to dare to touch them since Mr. Hermann Cardauns happened to cause such a wondrous embarra.s.sment for himself by them. As we all know, he wrote: "But as a lyrical poet, we have to say 'no' to him", though the entire collection does not contain a single lyrical poem! I also do not have to discuss my so-called "Union or Spemann"-volumes [a] here, because they have not been attacked anywhere, though I am only attacked in my capacity as an author for young people, and these are the only things I have written for the young generation. So, I will only deal with the "traveller's tales", published by Fehsenfeld, and the "trashy novels", which had been published by Munchmeyer; the latter I will discuss in the next chapter.

[a] This refers to a series of stories which were first published in a magazine for boys, published by Wilhelm Spemann, and were later collected in several books, which were published by a company called "Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft".

As mentioned before, my "traveller's tales" have to rise among the Arabs from the desert up to the Jebel Marah Durimeh and among the American Indians from the jungle and the prairie up to the Mount Winnetou. On this path, the reader shall develop from a low anima-person up to the realization of what it means to be a n.o.bly spirited person. At the same time, he shall experience how the anima transforms on this path into a soul and a mind. Therefore, these tales start in the first volume in the "desert". In the desert, i.e. in the nothingness, in complete ignorance about everything which concerns the anima, the soul, and the mind.

Stepping out into the desert and opening his eyes, the first thing my Kara Ben Nemsi, the first person narrator, the "self", mankind's great question, gets to see is a strange, little fellow, who is riding towards him on a large horse, has invented a long, famous name for himself, and even maintains that he was a Hadji, though he finally has to admit that he has never been to one of the holy cities of Islam, where the honourable t.i.tle of a Hadji is obtained. You see, that I am dressing up a genuinely German, and therefore domestic, psychological riddle into a foreign, oriental garment, to make it more interesting and to be able to solve it in a more understandable manner. This is what I mean when I maintain that all of these traveller's tales have to be interpreted as parables, i.e. figuratively or symbolically. There is no mysticism or anything similar involved. My symbols are so clear, so transparent, that nothing mystical can hide behind them at all.

This Hadji, who calls himself Hadji Halef Omar and adds even his father and grandfathers' names with the t.i.tle Hadji to his own, symbolises the human anima, which pretends to be the soul or even the mind, without even knowing what a soul or a mind really is.

This is a daily occurrence among us, not just in ordinary life, but also among learned people, but there such a blindness towards this mistake that I have to resort to Arabian characters and Arabian conditions to let the blind eyes see. Therefore, I send this Halef to Mecca in one of the very first chapters, which transforms his lie into the truth, because he is now really a Hadji, and then, immediately afterwards, I let him get acquainted with his "soul" - - - Hannah [a], his wife!

[a] This is a misspelling in the original text. The character is actually called Hanneh.

I hope that this example, which I take from my very first volume, says clearly what I want and how my books have to be read, to get to know their real contents. Let me follow it up with a second example: Kara Ben Nemsi is with the Persian tribe of the Jamikun.

This tribe is to be destroyed by the people of the Sillan. Then, the ustad, the leader of the Jamikun, sends a messenger to the shah, to ask him for help. This messenger has not even reached the shah yet, when he meets with the shah's hosts, who are telling him that they have been sent by the shah to help the Jamikun.

Thus, the shah had granted the ustad's request, even before it has reached him. But the shah represents G.o.d, and thus, I interpret by this tale the Christian teaching on prayer in Matthew 6:8: "Your father knows what you require, before you ask him!"

Furthermore, the ustad is n.o.body else but Karl May, and the people of Jamikun are his readers, which are to be destroyed by the Sillan. So, I am telling purely German events in a Persian disguise and render them by these means understandable for friends and enemies alike. Is this not a parable? Not symbolic? It certainly is! And could it be mystic? Not in the very least! It is so obviously a parable and so little mystic that, to be honest, everybody who would deny the former and suppose the latter would seem to me like a person who would deserve a name which I do not want to mention. Whoever does not go about reading my books with unconditionally hostile intentions and is honestly willing will, without much of an effort, find that their contents consist of almost nothing but parables. And to him who has once reached this realization, the numerous fables of heaven will quite surely not remain unnoticed, which are strewn all over these parables and which have to form the actual, deepest contents of my traveller's tales. These fables are also the material out of which I will have to develop my real life-work in the end of my final days.

After all, even my very first character, Hadji Halef Omar, is already a fable, the fable of the lost human soul, which can never be found again, unless it finds itself. And this Hadji is my own anima; yes, he is the anima of Karl May! By describing all the flaws of this Hadji, I disclose my own faults, and thereby, I make a confession the likes of which was probably never made before thus comprehensively and thus honestly by any author. I may very well maintain that I do not deserve in the least certain allegations which are being made by my opponents. If, for a change, these opponents would dare to talk thus openly about themselves as I talk about myself, then this so-called Karl-May-problem would have reached that state a long time ago, which it eventually has to reach, whether they like it or not.

For this Karl-May-problem is also a parable. It is nothing else but that great, general problem of mankind, which countless millions have already endeavoured to solve, without achieving any tangible result. Just the same, they have already, for several decades, endeavoured to work on me, without producing more than this pathetic caricature as which I live in the brains and the writings of those who feel called upon to solve problems, but always do this just there where there are none.

Let me furthermore name the fable of "Marah Durimeh", the soul of mankind, the fable of "Shakara", that n.o.ble soul of a woman, sent by G.o.d, this woman whom I have described with the features of my present wife. And then there are the fables of the "redeemed devil", the "immured G.o.d", the "petrified prayer", the "calcified souls", the "Beit-Ullah's columns of roses", the "jump into the past", the "jemma of the living and the dead", the "battle at the Jebel Allah", the "Lake Mahalama", the "mountain of the royal tombs", the "mir of Jinnistan", the "mir of Ardistan", the "city of the deceased", the "Jebel Muchallis", the "watershed of El Hadd", and many, many more. Considering these mentally and spiritually so significant, yes even hard, contents of my novels, it would be incomprehensible how they could be described as "literature for young people" and I as an "author for young people", if we would not know that all who commit this mistake have either not understood them or have not read them at all.

Even "Winnetou", which seems to be so easy to read, requires, when it approaches its end in the fourth volume, a reflection and understanding, which would surely be asking too much from a seventh-grader or a teenaged girl! When some people nevertheless continue using these expressions "literature for young people" and "author for young people", I have to describe this as an intentional misrepresentation, which is beneath every decent and serious critic.

But once the admission is made, honestly and according to the truth, that my "traveller's tales" have not been written for the young generation, the foundation of the nowadays commonplace supposition that they were harmful has been removed. Let them only be read by those to whom they are not harmful; I would not force anybody else to do so! What is the reason and purpose of all these allegations, I am now confronted with in hundreds of newspapers? As soon as one takes a closer look at these allegations, they lose all of their worth. I used to be praised; now, I am disapproved of. This has become the current fas.h.i.+on and will, like every fas.h.i.+on, turn into its opposite again. But this fas.h.i.+on is not just a fas.h.i.+on, but a scheme! Even if now my books were no longer read by anybody, this could not worry me in the least, for I know that this scheme will be found out very soon, resulting in the appropriate reaction. Moreover, if had fed my readers with nothing but entertainment, I would have to disappear from the scene, never to reappear again, and would be understanding enough, without having to be told so, to submit to this fate. But _during_my_"life_and_my_efforts"_I_have_committed_ _mistakes,_which_were_just_too_many_and_just_too_severe,_for_me_ _to_be_allowed_to_perish_and_to_disappear_forever_just_like_that._ _I_have_to_undo_the_damage!_ Whatever a mortal has sinned, he has to repent and atone for, and blessed is he who is granted an opportunity by heaven not to take his guilt with him beyond death, but to pay already for it here. I want to do this; I may do this, and I will do this! Moreover, I boldly state: I have already done this! I have already given to the law of man everything it had a right to demand from me a long time ago; I do not owe it anything any more! And what extends beyond those articles of the law created by man, I will settle by dedicating all that I am still going to write to this great creditor, who knows very well, whether I owe more than those others who think themselves better than May.

I am convinced that my sins, as far as I am to blame for them, are only in the area of my personal life, but not in my literature; in the latter area, I not conscious of any misdeeds. What I have achieved through my "traveller's tales", will be revealed only after my death by the thousands of letters I have received, but even then, only my biographer will get to see them; they will not be published. These works used to be praised and adored, until one day, a certain unscrupulous person had nothing better to do than to state in public that I had also written other things aside from them, but that those were "abysmally" indecent. Even if this had been true, it could not have changed the "traveller's tales", neither their inner contents nor their external form.

Nevertheless, from this day on, they were first regarded with suspicion, then they were slandered more and more, and finally they were even declared to be perfectly harmful and were expelled from the libraries, where they used to be welcomed before. Why?

Had they changed? No! Had the bibliographical customs, the laws of morality changed? No! Had the needs of the readers become different? This is not it either! But what other reason was there? This was simply because of this circle of people from the realm of trashy literature and colportage, who were determined to, as they themselves used to put it, "destroy me". But is it humanly possible that such a circle of people could gain such an extensive and incomprehensible influence on the world literature and its critics? Unfortunately yes! I will have to write about this in the next chapter. This mob does not even stop at casting their own sins and literary crimes upon me and at presenting themselves as spotless! There are so-called critics which have been staining my reputation for as long as ten years with all kinds of slander on account of the novels I wrote for Munchmeyer, but have not blamed the publisher a single time in even the slightest extent. I call this a disgrace!

It has been said that our publishers of trashy literature annually make fifty million marks from the German people. This is terrible, though this estimation is still far too low. A single trashy novel which is a so-called hit can cost the people more than five or six million, and there are catalogues in which, for instance, just the single company Munchmeyer is offering fifty-eight - read it and be amazed - fifty-eight of these novels at the same time! You can figure it out; do the multiplications!

What a loss! What an immense amount of poison and mischief! How many hundreds, or even thousands, of people are busy creating and distributing this poison! And now, open your newspapers, magazines, and books to see who is held responsible for all this, who is publicly accused, who is despised, jeered at, and slandered! Karl May, Karl May, again and again Karl May, and only and only Karl May! Where can ever another name be seen and read than just this one? Whatever have I done to be counted among the trash at all? Where are those two thousand real trashy authors, who restlessly make sure, year after year, that in Germany and in German-speaking Austria there will never be a shortage of trash?

In court, in "scientific" writings, in the meetings of commissions, in public speeches by writers, editors, teachers, ministers of the church, professors, artists, psychiatrists, at all fitting and unfitting occasions where the "moral degradation of the youth" is being discussed, Karl May is mentioned again and again! He is to blame, only he! He is the archetype of those who poison the youth! He is the father of all those ruthless characters like Captain Thurmer, Nick Carter, and Buffalo Bill!

My G.o.d, do these gentlemen really not know what they are doing?

What a sin they are committing? How they are talked about among those who know better? Let them name just a single case where it has been really proven in court, that someone has been corrupted by one of my books! Hundreds of trashy stories of the most morally corrupting kind have been read by such a boy, and also one volume or several volumes by Karl May. This one is known, but not the others; therefore, he must be the one to be singled out and to named as the perpetrator! Week after week, newspaper offices are sending me fifty, sixty, or seventy newspaper clips, where I am being executed instead of all those German trashy authors and trashy publishers. This is inhumanly cruel! They pile up their disgrace all over me, but tip their hats to those who are really guilty. Why are their names never mentioned? Why are these not nailed to the cross? There are hundreds of publishers and writers who have been punished for distributing indecent material. And even larger is the number of those who, with the full intent, publish filth for the youth, only to make money. Why are their names not given? Why are their crimes against the youth and the people ignored to the point of becoming guilty of being an accomplice? Why are they not attacked, but only me, the scapegoat for the entire mob of literature? The answer is very simple: It is a scheme, nothing but a scheme! And it can be nothing but a scheme, because no single person could possibly commit so many wrongdoings as I am charged with! I will have to shed some light on this with more details in the next chapter.

The accusations, which are being raised against me, have always been nothing but unsubstantiated statements. Not for a single one of them, a real proof has been given. On account of these accusations, I asked countless readers of my books, in letters and in personal conversations, whether they would be able to name one of my traveller's tales or one pa.s.sage from them, which might be described as having a harmful effect. No one has been able to name just a single line, to which this would apply. Even my most unrelenting opponent, the newspaper called "Kolnische Volkszeitung", has been compelled to give me the following attestation: "Everything which is offensive to the youth _has_ _been_carefully_avoided,_ though May's works are _not_at_all_only_ _targeted_at_them;_many_thousands_of_adults_ have already obtained a rich measure of recreation and information from these colourful images!" This attestation alone proves the current "scheme", because my books have remained entirely unchanged since that time, and the same gentleman who had attested this in public, was the first who has fallen victim to this scheme and has since then never been able to rise from this fall again.

To refute the allegations which are being raised against me, I feel compelled to risk committing an indiscretion by publis.h.i.+ng the following letter, an indiscretion which this gentlemen, whom I esteem highly and honestly, will probably forgive. Doctor Peter Rosegger wrote to me on July the 2nd of this year from Krieglach.

"Dear Sir!