Die Leute von Seldwyla, Band 2

Die Leute von Seldwyla, Band 2, is the second volume of Gottfried Keller’s cycle of stories set in the imaginary Swiss town of Seldwyla. The second volume was originally published in 1874 and 1875, nearly two decades after the first volume of 1856.

The five stories in this volume include Kleider machen Leute, the most famous of all Keller’s stories and one of the central works of nineteenth century German language fiction. The story follows a poor unemployed tailor’s apprentice who arrives in the small town of Goldach in fine clothes that mislead the townspeople into taking him for a wealthy nobleman. The complications that follow as he is wined and dined as a great gentleman, and the eventual unmasking, give the story its central comic structure, but the underlying point about how clothes and social signals construct identity is handled with the depth that lifts the story far above ordinary comedy.

The other four stories continue the Seldwyla cycle in various directions. Der Schmied seines Glückes follows a young man whose ambition to make his own fortune leads him through a series of complicated negotiations. Die mißbrauchten Liebesbriefe tells of a businessman who decides his wife should write him love letters. Dietegen is a darker story set in earlier centuries about a foundling. Das verlorene Lachen returns to a more contemporary setting and follows a young couple whose marriage is disrupted by religious and political differences.

The second volume is generally considered the stronger of the two volumes of the cycle, partly because Keller had matured as a writer in the intervening years and partly because Kleider machen Leute alone is one of the most enduring achievements of nineteenth century German prose.