![]() ![]() She is said to have been uncomfortable publishing details about herself. Spyri is the most widely read and translated Swiss author, yet little is known about her. Today, tourists can visit the Japanese Heidi village in Yamanashi Prefecture. “With a typical Japanese sense of perfection, Takahata created a delicate artwork that impresses with its care and attention to detail,” notes Wissmer. Takahata, who passed away in April 2018, had travelled to Switzerland to visit the original settings for Spyri’s novel and got his inspiration from the Alpine landscape. Heidi in Isao Takahata’s anime series “Heidi the Girl of the Alps,” 1974. Wissmer observes that Takahata’s cartoon led to street protests in Spain in 1976, with people demanding that the series be shown on prime time television and not just during the children’s afternoon slot. Isao Takahata’s 1974 animated cartoon series Heidi the Girl of the Alps not only marked the height of the Japanese adoration of Heidi, it also made her the heroine of an entire generation of children in Europe. Heidi’s popularity in Japan may be linked to the clash between tradition and modernity that is omnipresent in the novel, and to its representation of nature as a source of health and happiness and a manifestation of the sublime. The stories of how Heidi grew up, started her own family and lived her life as a mother and grandmother were written by Charles Tritten, the French translator of the initial two volumes. In the 1930s the French editor Flammarion and Henri Studer in Geneva published a serialised novel in addition to the French translation of the original. The Japanese translation contributed to Heidi’s international success and triggered a series of new translations in other languages. More than 30 editions of Heidi were subsequently published in Japan. The book was an adaptation to suit a Japanese audience, with all of the characters given Japanese names. According to Swiss author Jean-Michel Wissmer, while the novel was first translated into Japanese in 1920, it was a literary adaptation 5 years later that marked the beginning of a “true passion” for Heidi. In Japan, Heidi was highly popular long before the 1937 Hollywood movie. ![]() Shirley Temple in the role of Heidi 1937. Although the movie was entirely shot in the US, it reinforced the American idea of Switzerland as an Alpine paradise. This loose adaptation was a box office hit and soon reached European cinemas. The 1937 Hollywood movie by Allan Dwan, with child star Shirley Temple in the role of Heidi, was the first sound film of Spyri’s novel. Heidi’s first screen appearance was in a silent movie released in the US in 1920. The original Heidi novel has inspired many a film producer. In English alone, there are about 13 different translations. Some translators mistreated the original text to soften the story, observes Nicolas Ducimetière, deputy director of the Bodmer foundation in an interview with Swiss Radio and Television RTS. Heidi’s story has been progressively altered in various translations and adaptations. Like Mark Twain’s ‘Tom Sawyer ’ and Lewis Carroll’s ‘Alice ’, Heidi was part of an emerging children’s literature in the 19 th century. Seeing that she is homesick, the family’s physician Dr Classen insists that she return to her Alpine home. Unlike most 19 th century emigrants, Heidi’s exile comes to an end. There, shut up in the mansion of an upper-class German family, she falls ill. The contrast between the austere mountain life and the urban setting of an emigrant’s daily routine abroad is brought to the reader’s attention when Aunt Dete returns to the mountain pasture and takes Heidi to Frankfurt. Illustration by Wilhelm Claudius in the Heidi edition of 1889. ![]() Heidi soon wins him over with her exuberance, warm character and interest in nature. The paternal grandfather, called Alp-Öhi, a Swiss German expression meaning Uncle on the Alp, does not welcome his new charge at first. Heidi has been an orphan since the death of her father on a construction site and loss of her mother to grief shortly after. Some 330,000 Swiss emigrated between 18, most headed for the United States. To make matters worse, many Swiss farmers saw their potato harvest destroyed by the blight wreaking havoc in Europe. Poverty, hunger and inhumane factory conditions were widespread in 19 th-century Switzerland. Like many Swiss workers and peasants at the time, the aunt emigrated to make a living. Dete leaves the orphan girl with the grumpy old man and hurries away to take up a job as a maid in Germany. The novel starts with a sad moment: Aunt Dete brings 5-year-old Heidi to her paternal grandfather who lives in seclusion on a mountain pasture above the village of Maienfeld in the canton of Graubünden. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |