In einem fluktuirenden Zwischenland - zwischen den Zeiten und

ihren Moralbegriffen, zwischen Bewutem und Unbewutem,

zwischen Wirklichkeit und sinnenbewegter Phantasie - schwebt dieses
unvergleichliche erzhlerische Kunstwerk. Traumnovelle, Wiener
Nachtnovelle. Sie ldt, reich an faszinierenden und beklemmenden
Bildern, zu vielfltiger Analyse ein und entzieht sich doch der Analyse;
sie ist unausdeutbar, unerschpflich: eine Ehegeschichte dem
Hauptthema nach, also die Geschichte einer Ehekrise. Nur fhrt
Brchigkeit hier nicht zum Bruch, sondern beinahe berraschend zu
Selbstreinigung, Heimkehr und Morgenhelle.
Throughout his career Schnitzler depicted the confusion created by
conflicting cultural paradigms and the individuals desires. Stanley Ku-
bricks motion picture Eyes Wide Shut (1999), based on Traumnovelle,
draws attention to some of the parallels and differences between
Vienna of the last and New York of the most recent turn of the

22
century. The fact that Schnitzlers story has lost its earlier ability to
shock demon- strates that notions of morality and authority have
undergone radical changes in the last seventy-five years. At the same
time, the lack of ac- claim for the movie may be the result not only of
Schnitzlers historic specificity but also of discomfort about the way in
which relationships and the self are configured. A movie that
undermines the potential for heterosexual coupled bliss and draws
into question the viability of the nuclear family would still today be
problematic. Some of the issues raised by Schnitzler and Kubrick
remain unresolved in the postmodern era and are by and large taboo
in popular culture.

More provocative than the orgy scenes in Eyes Wide Shut is the
theme of complicity. Both in Kubricks movie and Schnitzlers novella,
upstand- ing citizens are implicated in the world of drugs, illicit sex,
violence, and crime. The cross-connections imply that it is impossible
for Western cul- ture to sustain its values of propriety and family and
to prosper in isolation from the social realms where these norms do
not and cannot apply. Moreover, both works show the dividing lines
between the different spheres to be imperceptible. The bourgeois
world and the so-called dark underside are one and the same. The
conclusion that ignorance, deliber- ately chosen over awareness, is
the only way for the bourgeois dream to continue is no less upsetting
now than it was in the early twentieth cen- tury. Schnitzlers play
implies that in spite of their verbal, emotional, and legal
commitments, the partners in a relationship are alone and live as
strangers to the person with whom they share their house and their
bed. Maintaining their idyllic family life and the illusion of exclusivity
requires of Fridolin and Albertine role-playing and self-imposed
ignorance. Traumnovelle is an excellent example of the multilayered
identity con- struction in Schnitzler. A persons social role and function
and his or her existential isolation present an unresolvable, even
tragic dilemma.

Schnitzlers work is part of the ubiquitous fin-de-sicle project of

23
developing expressions appropriate to modern reality. In an earlier
transitional era Goethe had designed Werther, a character as
pathbreaking as Anatol and Lieutenant Gustl. As with Werther, the
struggle of Schnitzlers protagonists with new modalities and levels of
consciousness takes place in isolation from the world of work and
careers, as if in defi- ance of the bourgeois work ethic. Unable and
unwilling to assume the roles their respective societies have in store
for them, and for the most part mildly bored, Schnitzlers young men,
like Werther, seek authentic experiences through their emotions and

24
senses. Their encounters with women and their interactions with
one another provide them with a sense of self. However, in contrast to
Werther, who is taken in by the senti- mental drama of which he is the
producer and the director, Schnitzlers Anatol and Fritz Lobheimer
(Liebelei) are beyond deceiving themselves. Like Schnitzler, the
diarist and autobiographer, they take part in and at the same time
stand apart from their culture of feeling.

Schnitzler explores the concepts through which his social class and
generation defined themselves without validating reality constructs of

28
earlier epochs or the fashionable ideologies of his time. From a
distance he reveals the inner workings of Viennese society, but he
 29
does not hold his characters up to ridicule. Reigen (1903) and
Traumnovelle are among those works that expose the relativity of
social norms without losing sight of the fact that they determine an
individuals status and social range. Fridolin and Albertine are
perfectly well suited to their station in life they would be incapable
of functioning in a setting that defies the moral double standard on
which their relationship is based.

IN THE SPRING of 1902, Arthur Schnitzler completed an eight-page 1

story now known under the title Die Fremde (1902). While this story,

during the one hundred years that have passed since its first
publication, has received comparatively little critical attention, the
concerns about issues of gender and class raised in Die Fremde are in
fact of a piece with those addressed in Schnitzlers better-known
narratives, such as Frulein Else (1924) or Traumnovelle (1926). Like
Schnitzlers firmly canonized narratives, Die Fremde uses a complex
web of narrative discourses and allusions and an intricate interplay of
form and content to articulate a critique of bourgeois morality and
gender stereotypes. Thus, Die Fremde can be understood as
representative of the concerns addressed in Schnitzlers narrative
fiction in general. In particular, Die Fremde focuses critically on crises
of masculinity at the turn of the last century.

Traumnovelle reweaves themes from Schnitzlers previous works to

offer a glimpse of feminized figures who go even further to achieve a
voice and a gaze of their own. The dangers inherent in this attainment
and the damage it does to the male psyche almost destroy the main
characters. Yet, this later narrative also offers glimpses of a different
kind of perception that does not trap figures in the hierarchy of
observer and observed. The desire and release of desire intimately
bound to these roles complicate the loosening of their grip on the
mindset of the characters, especially on Fridolin, the threatened
husband.

While Fridolin is astounded that his wife, Albertine, expresses sexual

desire for other men (for a Danish officer, for example), just as
Cyprian was with Justina, he is the one who increasingly becomes a
spectacle as he withdraws into himself and plays over in his mind
imagined scenes of Albertine and the officer in bed. As his masculine
self-identity falters, images of dying men or men in danger increase,
as do those of mysteri- ous female figures of all ages and social
classes. Fridolin projects his loss of a sense of controlling masculinity
onto the figures he encounters. The different stages on his journey to
rediscover his identity all revolve around sight and looking.

The problem of the gaze appears in the first paragraph, as Fridolin

and Albertines daughter reads a fairy tale about a prince alone under
the night sky. She falls asleep just as she reads the words und sein

69
Blick , but when her father closes her book, Das Kind sah auf

70
wie ertappt, thus coming to consciousness under the power of the

71
male gaze. Yet, the mother is also watching them both, and her
presence draws the fathers attention back to her, und mit
zrtlichem Lcheln, das nun nicht mehr dem Kinde allein galt,

72
begegneten sich ihre Blicke. The motifs of sleep- ing and waking
combine with that of looking to introduce the recasting in the novella
of the viewer/viewed duality as related to being awake or conscious.
Through visual metaphors the novella shows how the male figure is
awakened from his complacent position of authority and forced to
acknowledge the real strength of the woman characters position and
subjectivity.

The male and female positions appear at first on an equal level, for
both parents exchange glances with each other. Both seem at first to
be self-aware, but as the narrative progresses, Fridolin is the one
whose gaze needs to be readjusted. Only after Albertines and his
confessions that each has lusted after someone else does the
conventional hierarchy of their position as watcher or watched come
into view. Albertine shows that like a man she too surveys others for
their sexual desirability. Specifically, while on vacation with her
husband she saw a Danish officer, who became the object of her
fantasies and of her furtive, admiring glances, without apparent
knowledge of her desire. Fridolins shock at his wifes heretofore
unexpressed sexual longings cannot be assuaged by his own
confession about a fifteen-year-old Danish girl he found appealing
during a morning walk. The sudden interrupting announcement that a
male patient of Fridolin has just suffered a heart attack and needs
urgent care parallels Fridolins wounded pride and need to cure
himself of his slipping status at the top of the male/female hierarchy
of libidinous control.

The attempts to regain his lost sense of male superiority push him
further into a subordinate role. Significantly, the women Fridolin en-
counters become increasingly powerful, although often childlike, a re-
flection of his own childlike psychological position. Marianne, the
daughter of the heart-attack victim, for example, cannot engage him
in any meaningful looks and maintains a submissive posture. Yet, her
obvi- ous longing for him exerts an attraction that makes it difficult to
leave her. The prostitute Mizzi is more self-confident, yet still playing
the role of erotic object by undressing before him. This encounter
happens after he has met and then yielded to the gaze of a fraternity
student who bumped into him, causing him to wonder whether he is a
coward, or in other words, whether he is still manly. His initial
diffidence toward Mizzi, his refusal to play his role of erotic gazer,
causes her to stop her game, dress, and converse with him. His
subsequent attempt to seduce her fails because he has allowed
himself to exchange looks and words with her. Once again, speech
interferes with illusion and interrupts the erotic power of the
objectifying gaze.

The eyes of his old friend Nachtigall, which bore into him after he
enters a caf, stress the role reversal he has undergone, for he is now
the object of penetrating looks. His eagerness to participate in the
erotic, secretive meeting that Nachtigall describes is a chance to
regain his male role, for Nachtigall informs him that naked women will
be present women who are offering themselves to the power of the
voyeuristic gaze. His ensuing adventure at the costume shop, under
the stare of the owners mentally disturbed, sexually precocious
daughter, arouses and frightens him, but also makes him feel
protective of the girl. He experi- ences both a renewed sense of
control and a fear of losing it.

However, the climactic masked ball stages Fridolins complete ob-

jectification. He is the object of mens and womens voyeuristic stares
and speaks only in response to their questions. He is powerless yet
also excited in his weak position. The masked woman whom he
admires appears to know more about him than can be explained.
Indeed, the whole society appears to know him and judge him harshly.
The paranoid atmosphere of this secret meeting hints at danger. That
danger is psy- chological, for it threatens to destroy completely his
attempts to regain his position as subject of the penetrating gaze.
Fridolin at this point still measures masculine value in terms of
dominating the feminine. In Eric Santners words, What makes
Fridolin so unsuited for this game is his impulse to possess in an

73
absolute way the woman he desires. This sterile, erotic adventure,
which involved only looking, no action, pales in comparison to
Albertines later dream of having sex with the Dane and watching
Fridolin be crucified for his loyalty. While she can articulate her desires
to him and thus integrate them into her consciousness, he re- mains

74
mute about his, still in their thrall.

As a doctor, he is used to making decisions based on observation, but

empirical knowledge is of little help here, as it also did little for Dr.
Copus in Paracelsus. Fridolin has become like the young women and
girls he gazed upon. Albertine is the one who exercises authority in
her questions to him and in her forgiving look at him. Yet, he fears her
unfathomable wishes because they are not under his control; they are
not meant to attract his looks. Albertine observes him while knowing
things that he does not, just as the masked ball participants did. He is
the object of her voyeuristic gaze. After his attempts to revoke this
role reversal fail, his leave-taking from the corpse of the figure he
believes to be the masked woman from the ball becomes an adieu to

75
his previous objecti- fying gaze. He seeks atonement from her dead
eyes and from his own paralysis at not being able to articulate his
fears and desires, in not being able to see beyond his misconceptions.
And he discovers that in all the unknown faces he observed,
ununterbrochen seine Gattin als die Frau vor Augen geschwebt

76
war. Only after he has been able to tell every- thing to Albertine

77
does he begin to see again, but the conclusion im- plies this
resolution is only temporary. The woman observer, Albertine, turns
out to be the one most in control of her speech and field of vision.
Fridolin regains his speech and redirects his sight from a strict focus
on possession to an exchange of looks, with Albertine as his model.
How- ever, as with many of Schnitzlers tales, this reciprocity is under
threat from half-conscious impulses that can cloud vision and silence
speech, that can make for a gefhrliche Dynamisierung der
Beziehung.

These four examples reveal recurring attempts in Schnitzlers work to

grasp the uncertainties of modern subjectivity as a problem of vision
and voice. Speech as true expression of half-conscious desires
allows for a subject stance that may or may not be coded as
masculine or femi nine. Paracelsus is forced to recognize the
physicality and thus instability of the objects in his field of vision after
Justina speaks up, Ccilie rejects him, and Anselm flees. As their roles
change, so must his. Gustl, on the other hand, remains trapped within
his illusion of masculine bravado, unable to perceive how
anachronistic his way of seeing has become and how much his
position has shifted toward the feminine he strives to objectify. By
having Else become mute and blind as self-punishment for her brief
revolt against her visual commodification, the narrative stresses the
isolating effect of the feminine manner of observation inculcated in
her. On a more utopian note, Fridolin learns from Albertine to express
himself and to accept that each of them has aspects that elude the
others purview. He is compelled to abandon his domineering gaze for
one like hers, at least for a while.

Different ways of seeing, then, show a clash between idealized no-

tions of stability and shifting experiences of the gendered self. Gender
also affects sight. There is a tension between looking as an
emancipating act, watching in order to control, and observing oneself
as a strategy of conformity. The narratives reveal an increasing
insecurity about mascu- line gender roles combined with an inability
to act thus the need for an illusion of acting to preserve a
semblance of masculine control. How- ever, the weakening of the
male observer does not mean that the female observer fills his vacant
role. Nor is the female position necessarily objec- tified. Rather, the
positions of the observer and observed alternate be- tween each
other and within themselves, thereby exceeding notions of a purely
masculine or a feminine gaze. These literary selections thus evince
the complexity of Schnitzlers engagement with questions of gender
and subjectivity and link his ideas to other explorations of mod- ern
visual culture in the arts, philosophy, and science of his time.
Traumnovelle (1925/1926)

Im Ansatz hat Schnitzler seine Geschichte wie ein psychologisches

Experiment angelegt. Zu Beginn fhrt er vor, wie zwei Eheleute sich
selbst und ihrem Partner bis dahin verschwiegene Sehnschte offen-
baren und wie sie auf diese Weise aus der Illusion konventionell
begrndeter Rollenbilder erwachen. Nicht der Besuch einer Redoute,
der die Eheleute noch in der Nacht zuvor zu einem schon lange Zeit
nicht mehr so hei erlebten Liebesglck (TRA, 6) zusammenfhrte,
sondern ein Gesprch ber ihre verborgenen, kaum geahnten
Wnsche (ebd., 7) leitet die den Fortbestand von Ehe und
Kleinfamilie gefhrdende Krise ein. Im Folgenden betreten sie, was ihr
Autor als eine Art fluktuierendes Zwischen- land zwischen
Bewusstem und Unbewusstem (AB, 455) bezeichnet (Schnitzler
versteht darunter einen Bereich des Halbbewussten, in dem sich
sowohl Elemente von Freuds ber-Ich wie auch des soge- nannten Es
versammeln. Freuds schematische Tren- nung in Ich, ber-Ich und Es
hlt er dagegen fr geistreich, aber knstlich; ebd, 283; vgl.
Rohrwas- er 2003). Fr den Aufenthalt in diesem Zwischen- land
sind die beiden Figuren allerdings ungleich gerstet. Aus historischer
Sicht gestaltet Schnitzler hier zugleich die gendertypischen Vertreter
unter- schiedlicher Zeiten: Albertine entspricht in mancher Hinsicht
dem Konzept der modernen neuen Frau der Nachkriegs- und
Nachkaiserzeit, whrend Fri- dolin den Denkmustern der mnnlich
dominierten Gesellschaft der Vorkriegszeit und Donaumonarchie
verhaftet ist.

Albertine, die zuerst den Mut zu einer offenen Mitteilung (TRA, 8)

findet, dokumentiert mit ih- rem Verhalten und ihrer Erzhlweise, dass
sie den Willen und die Fhigkeit zur genauen Selbstbeob- achtung
besitzt und dass sie in der Lage ist, auch Vorgnge am Rande ihres
Bewusstseins wahrzuneh- men und mit allen Widersprchen
sprachlich genau zu erfassen. Diese besondere Befhigung zur kriti-
schen Selbstreflexion wird im Verlauf der erzhlten Geschichte durch
Albertines ungewhnlich diffe- renzierte Erzhlung eines Traums
besttigt, in dem sie hemmungslos eine animalische Form von Sexua-
litt jenseits aller Konvention auslebt und ihrer Ag- gression gegen
einen Partner Ausdruck verleiht, der sich nicht als der erhoffte
Mrchenprinz, sondern als ein im Innersten schwacher Mann erwiesen
hat (Scheffel 1997, 187189).

Der widerstrebend und nur auf Albertines Auf- forderung hin

erzhlende Fridolin vermag dagegen offenbar weder zum Innern
seiner Frau noch zu sei- nem eigenen wirklich Zugang zu finden.
Albertines Eingestndnis sexueller Wnsche, die nicht an die
Institution der Ehe gebunden sind, berfordert den in seinem Fhlen
und Handeln offensichtlich von den Konventionen einer brgerlichen,
den weibli- chen Sexus tabuisierenden Gesellschaft geprgten Mann.
Seine Reaktion auf Albertines Erinnerung an den Abend vor ihrer
Verlobung etwa zeigt, dass er den mit ihrem Gestndnis verbundenen
Vorwurf mangelnden Mutes nicht versteht bzw. nicht verste- hen will.
Statt zu erlutern, warum er Albertine nicht als Geliebte, sondern nur
als Ehefrau umwerben wollte, unterstellt er seiner Frau den Wunsch
nach reiner Triebbefriedigung und eine allein dem Zufall unterworfene
Wahl des Partners.

Den unterschiedlichen Voraussetzungen der bei- den Protagonisten

entspricht, dass Fridolin im wei- teren Verlauf der Geschichte zunchst
nicht als Er- zhler, sondern nur als Handelnder in Erscheinung tritt.
Im Rahmen einer internen Fokalisierung, die zwischen dem zweiten
und dem Anfang des siebten Kapitels dominiert, wird der Leser zum
Zeugen von Empfindungen und Vorgngen im Innern der Figur, die
sich der durch Wien irrende Fridolin selbst nicht bewusst machen will
oder kann. Mit Hilfe von er- zhltechnischen Mitteln wie der erlebten
Rede und Anstzen des Inneren Monologs lsst sich in actu verfolgen,
wie der seiner selbst einst so sichere Arzt in der besonderen
Atmosphre einer lauen Vorfrh- lingsnacht immer weiter fort aus
dem gewohnten Bezirk seines Daseins in irgendeine andere, ferne,
fremde Welt (TRA, 28) entrckt wird, und wie der Aufenthalt in dieser
Welt Fridolins starre Denk- und Verhaltensmuster so offensichtlich
berfordert, dass er schlielich einsehen muss, was Albertine mit der
Platzierung der Maske auf seinem Kopfkissen sinn- fllig zum
Ausdruck bringt: Nicht nur zu Albertines, sondern auch zu Fridolins
alltglichem Leben geh- ren Schein und Lge (ebd., 77), d.h.
stereotype Bilder von sich und dem Anderen und zugleich ein Inneres,
das bei nherem Hinsehen voller Wider- sprche und Rtsel, voller
geheimer ngste und Sehnschte ist.

Infolge seiner Erfahrungen gewinnt auch Fridolin an Offenheit und

einer gewissen Distanz gegenber sich selbst. Zu seiner Entwicklung
gehrt, dass er die Rolle eines Erzhlers bernimmt, der seine Erleb-
nisse in einer ihm bis dahin fremde[n] Welt mit- teilen und damit
sprachlich vergegenwrtigen mchte: Ich will dir alles erzhlen
(ebd., 96), er- klrt der am Ende seiner Krfte (ebd.) angelangte
Fridolin der soeben erwachten Albertine in der zweiten Nacht der
erzhlten Zeit. Dass auch der Ehe- mann Zugang zu seinem Innern
findet und sich berdies dem Gerechtigkeitsgedanken in der Ero- tik
(Blum 1931/2001, 447) ffnet, ist die psycholo- gisch realistische
Bedingung dafr, dass beide Ehe- partner sich am Ende als erwacht
(TRA, 97) be- trachten knnen mit dem Ergebnis, dass nicht etwa
eine Desillusionierung im negativen Sinn (Kim 2007, 228), sondern
eine Neulegitimation ihrer brgerlichen Existenz erfolgt und die Ehe
der Figuren eine neue Qualitt der Bewusstheit ge- winnt (Lukas
1996, 211). Die Fortsetzung der eheli- chen Gemeinschaft in der
dynamischen und prinzi- piell offenen Gestalt einer nunmehr
beiderseitig er- klrten Kombination von Ehe + Liebesbeziehung
(ebd., 212) ermglicht jedoch nicht allein dieser Be-
wusstwerdungsprozess. Entscheidend dafr ist vor allem die
Erfahrung beider Protagonisten, dass die Bindung an den Partner zwar
nicht der Natur all ih- rer sexuellen Begierden, wohl aber ihren
individuel- len seelischen Bedrfnissen entspricht. Die von Schnitzler
inszenierte vollkommene Parallelitt die- ser Erfahrung ist allerdings
ebenso wenig reali- stisch wie etwa die Tatsache, dass Albertines
Traum zahlreiche Analogien zu den nchtlichen Erlebnis- sen Fridolins
enthlt (einschlielich der Zuflle, die den Abbruch von Fridolins
Abenteuern bewir- ken).

Zugleich reflektiert er die Mglichkeit einer berwindung der im Blick-

punkt so vieler Werke der Moderne stehenden Ver- einzelung des
Subjekts. Grundlegend fr seine Ge- schichte von den
Voraussetzungen einer ber den Augenblick hinausreichenden
Gemeinschaft von Mann und Frau sind dabei zwei unterschiedliche
Prinzipien des Erzhlens. Im Rahmen der erzhlten Geschichte zeigt
er psychologisch realistisch, wie seine Figuren aus der Illusion eines
scheinbar selbst- verstndlichen, tatschlich aber mrchenhaften Mit-
einanders erwachen, indem sie ihre unausgespro- chenen Wnsche
artikulieren und dank einer beson- ders reflektierten Form von
Erzhlen Abstand zu bislang gltigen Konzepten von sich selbst und
Zu- gang zu ihrem Innern gewinnen. Zu diesem Prozess gehrt ein
bemerkenswertes Bild vom Verhltnis der Geschlechter: Es ist der
Mann, der mit seiner kon- ventionellen Form des Denkens hinter der
als ver- gleichsweise modern konzipierten Frau zurcksteht und der
sich erst im Verlauf der erzhlten Geschichte zu ihrer
Bewusstseinsstufe und ihrem komplexeren Bild von der Wirklichkeit
eines prinzipiell dynami- schen Lebens entwickelt. Dass dies so
problemlos geschieht und dass beide Figuren dem bislang Ver-
drngten mit Hilfe des Erzhlens so selbstverstnd- lich den Stachel
der Bedrohung nehmen und das Kernlose des Lebens
(Hofmannsthal 1978, 42) un- beschadet erkennen und gemeinsam
berwinden, bersteigt jedoch die Grenzen des Erzhlens nach dem
Prinzip eines psychologischen Realismus. Es ist nur deshalb mglich,
weil Schnitzler seine Erzh- lung vom Erzhlen und Erwachen der
Figuren und damit auch die Abfolge des Geschehens in der
Traumnovelle bewusst mrchenhaft komponiert.

Die Begriffs- und Systembildungen der Freud- schen Psychoanalyse,

aber auch von Religion und Wissenschaft im Allgemeinen, hat
Schnitzler als eine Flucht aus der chaotischen Wahrheit [...] in den
trgerischen Trost einer willkrlich geordneten Welt (AB, 26)
verstanden. In seiner Traumnovelle versucht er solchen Trug zu
vermeiden. In diesem Sinne bindet er die vorgefhrte Entdeckung des
alle soziale Bindungen gefhrdenden Abgrund[s] der Triebwelt
(Spiel 1981) durch Mann und Frau in die Form einer Gegenwelt ein,
deren Sinnbildungsmus- ter und trstende Ordnung er seinerseits
erkennbar nach den poetologischen Regeln eines Mrchens aus einer
fernen Welt gestaltet. Nicht zuletzt dank Stan- ley Kubricks nicht in
allen Details, aber doch bis in viele Dialoge bemerkenswert texttreuer
Verfilmung unter dem Titel Eyes Wide Shut (1999) (s. Kap. IV.3.3)
zhlt die Traumnovelle heute zu den wohl populrsten und meist
rezipierten Werken Schnitz- lers.