Fontane Forensic: Solving the Ellernklipp Mystery

Abstract

Let us assume that there is a serious author who plays the same game with the reader as a cunning real suspect does with the police and the courts. If he succeeded, not in evading justice, but in not being understood, anyone who finally noticed what was really going on in the text would have to reopen the case, i.e., declare all previous interpretations null and void – not the politic thing to do! One cannot call a tale of crime a murder mystery, fail to notice that no murder was committed, overlook the sparse clues as to what happened to the supposed victim, and then claim to understand it. The following study will demonstrate that such has been the reception of Theodor Fontane's least celebrated tale, Ellernklipp. Habeas corpus, first established in England in 1679 to prevent willful incarceration, is a legal principle requiring the authorities either to charge arrested persons with a felony, or to release them. In real life, it amounts to a rule for action; in detective and crime stories, to a type of plot. Of course, it was not intended to mean Thou shalt have a body, and Latinists and legalists may revolt at such literalistic use of the venerable principle. Nevertheless, both great and mediocre writers, not to mention their eager readers, cannot be entirely wrong. Countless novel and movie plots revolve around the question: If there was a murder, where is the corpse? Many detective stories portray characters who blindly ignore all the clues. If millions of people can understand plots in which the accused deceives and denies all the way to the gallows, yet be satisfied with his or her guilt, then it ill behooves experts of literature to reject outright any interpretation not confirmed in writing by the author. Of course that involves equating authors with real suspects; but who else commits anything real in fiction? First, let us examine the crucial scene in which father Baltzer Bocholt angrily confronts his SOn Martin at a narrow point on the cliff for which the novella is named. He knows what his boy has been up to with his foster-