Poets and thinkers, judges and hangmen

Among my German set books at school was Friedrich Dürrenmatt’s 1955 novella Der Richter und sein Henker. The title is usually put into English as The Judge and his Hangman, which is a perfectly good translation that goes with the content of the book.

But the title has another significance that is lost in the translation. It may be that my German master told me about it (he was an exceptionally good teacher) and that I had forgotten. Anyway, I was surprised recently to read of its connection with the fact that Germany is, or at least was until 1914, known as a land of poets and thinkers. In German these are Dichter und Denker and Dürrenmatt’s title is a deliberately ironic play on this phrase.

This was not original on Dürrenmatt’s part though. The phrase dates back to 1909 when the satirist Karl Kraus mocked the Dichter und Denker (poets and thinkers) with his anti-slogan Richter und Henker (judges and hangmen).

I found this in Ruth Sanders’ book German, Biography of a Language and I am indebted to LanguageHat’s review of the book for bringing it to my attention.

Comments

[Barrie]

Dürrenmatt was, of course, Swiss. The sting in the title would, then, have been aimed at his neighbours.