The Mysterious Neue Jugendführer and Müller’s Buchhandlung

Der neue jugendführer. Pest: In Müller’s Buchhandlung, [1820?]. (Cotsen)

Above is a most mysterious print (a loose end that turned up during our recent temporary office move). My best guess is that it is uncut proof for the conjugate frontispiece and title page for the book Der neue Jugendführer [The new youth leader]. As the title page points out this book was published “In Müller’s Buchhandlung” (In Müller’s Bookstore) in Pest, Hungary. The lengthy subtitle makes clear that this book is an instructive (and well illustrated) polyglot primer: Der neue jugendführer : ein nützliches, und angenehmes A.B.C. = Buchstabier und Lese = bilderbuch fur die Jugend, mit 128 Abbildungen, nebst Deutsch, Französischen, und Ungarischen benennungen [The new youth leader : a useful, and pleasant A.B.C. = spelling and reading = picture book for the youth, with 128 illustrations, besides German, French, and Hungarian designations].

Curiously, however, there seem to be no surviving copies of such a title. So how can this be the title page for the “Zweite Auflage” [second edition]? Perhaps it’s as simple as concluding that the work was never published. Yet compounding the conundrums around the title is that since this is the neue jugendführer, one might expect to be able to locate the original Jugendführer. But again, no dice (to be pedantically clear, however, there are works containing “Jugendführer” in the title, but most are later than the above print and published by different publishers in mostly German cities).

“Title page” for closer examination, notice the absence of a publication date

While attempting to date the item I was able to locate a paltry few other works published in Pest by “Müller’s Buchhandlung” or “Joseph Müller’s Buchhandlung” from 1818 to 1823. All of these seem to be adult titles, mostly dealing with history and religion. After this time “Müller’s Buchhandlung” seems to move around a bit with titles appearing in Albendorf, Poland and Lucerne, Switzerland) Then again, Müller is a pretty common German last name and there are a number of bookshops and publishers operated by Muellers throughout the German-speaking world.

So maybe the “frontispiece” will yield some helpful information?

“Frontispiece” of Müller’s bookstore

The hand-colored etching (with engraving) ostensibly depicts the real Müller’s bookstore in Pest. The caption gives voice to the imploring youngster: “O, Mutter, ich bitte dich, nehme mir den Jugendführer!” (O, Mother, I beg you, take me to the youth leader!). Hard to make out above, the illustration is signed: “Perger del.” on the left and “Lehnhardt sc.” on the right. So, given the rough dates above, the illustration was “delineavit” [designed by] either Sigismund Ferdinand von Perger (1778-1841) or his son Anton Perger (1809-1876). The “sculpsit” [engraving by] Lehnhardt, was as close to an attribution as I could find.

Unfortunately, we might never know more about Müller, his bookstore, or his Jugendführers. But clearly, enigmas abound at the Cotsen Children’s Library, and it’s always fun to see what we can discover.


For other Cotsen forays into the (more recent) bookstore world, check out this post by Jeff Barton about some notable bookstores on the Pacific Northwest:
On the Road with the Cotsen Library, or, Some Independent Bookstores Are Alive and Well

another by Andrea Immel about a famous bookstore in LA:
Tour The Last Bookstore in Los Angeles

and last but not least, Minjie Chen’s about bookstores in Shanghai and Abu Dhabi

Notes of a Summer Traveller 2

 

 

Mother Hubbard and Her Dog Go Abroad in Translation

Nancy Cock’s Song-Book. [London]: Printed for T. Read, [1744]. (Cotsen 7262290)

It’s no coincidence that the very first two nursery rhyme anthologies, the song-books of Nancy Cock and Tommy Thumb, were collected and published in 1744 by some merry wags in London.   And it’s no exaggeration to say that English language nonsense is rooted in its vibrant and salty tradition of nursery rhymes.  Nonsense isn’t supposed to travel well because the humor depends so much on the resources of the language in which it was created.  If that were true, then why has Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland has been translated into so many languages?  A better explanation might be that when there is a will, there is a way to recast the wordplay so people in another culture can delight in its absurdities.

Old Mother Hubbard and the antics of her dog is another classic of English nonsense that has made people in Europe laugh too, a fact that you won’t learn from the indispensable Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes.  The Opies recorded the continuation and a sequel “by another hand” issued shortly after the John Harris first edition of 1805, imitations like Old Mother Lantry and her Goat (1819), the first pantomime version of 1833, and a translation into German ca. 1830.

The Comic Adventures of Old Mother Hubbard and Her Dog. Illustrated by Robert Branston? London: J. Harris, 1820. (Cotsen 3688)

What the Opies didn’t make clear is that it was the 1820 edition in Harris’s “Cabinet of Amusement and Instruction” with the hand-colored wood engravings attributed to Robert Branson that captured imaginations overseas, not the original edition illustrated with etchings.  See the beautiful high-relief carvings of the amazing dog’s head in the corners of the elaborate gilt frame of the good old lady’s portrait?

Her steeple-crowned hat on top of a mob-cap, the gown with a laced stomacher and ruffled sleeves over a quilted petticoat, became iconic internationally, as did her dog’s ensemble of an opera hat, powdered wig, waistcoat, breeches, stockings with clocks and buckled shoes.  They are both unmistakable in the New Adventures of Mother Hubbard, when they visit the sights of London ca. 1840, the year Victoria married her cousin Albert.

(Cotsen 3688)

 

Cock Robin and the New Mother Hubbard. London: James March, not before 1840. (Cotsen 26792)

Audot published a French prose translation, Aventures plaisantes de Madame Gaudichon et de son chien, in 1832.  Baumgaertner in Leipzig quickly picked it up and repackaged it as an entertaining text carefully annotated for German-speaking children to learn French.   The dog is named “Zozo” here (he isn’t called anything in the English original).

Aventures Plaisantes de Madame Gaudichon et de son Chien. Leipzig: Baumgaertners Buchhandlung, [ca. 1830]. (Cotsen 3708)

The German translation,  unlike the French one, is in verse and it tries to preserve  something of the rhythm in English.   The illustrations are very careful copies of Branston’s for the Harris Cabinet edition, although the colorist occasionally changed the palette.  Mother Hubbard’s cloak is still crimson and her stomacher green, but her quilted petticoat is light yellow and her hat pale green with crimson trim.  In some of the illustrations, the stomacher is Dutch blue!  Frau Hubbard offers her Liebchen a more generous portion of beer than Mother Hubbard did in a stein redrawn with gently swelling contours.  Unfortunately it conforms to one national stereotype of Germans as beer swillers…

Komische Abentheuer der Frau Hubbard und ihrein Hunde. Mainz: Joseph Scholz, ca. 1830. (Cotsen 23460)

Mother Hubbard and her spaniel turn up in an 1840 Baumgaertner picture book, Herr Kickebusch und sein Katzchen Schnurr, which seems to be inspired partly by old Dame Trot, the owner of a clever kitty, whose rhyme predated the first appearance of Mother Hubbard both in English and in German translation by a few years.   The story accompanying plate VIII describes how  Madame Kickebusch, the lady in the Mother Hubbard costume comes to visit Herr Kickebusch with her gallant little gentleman, Azor.  Here the two pets are being introduced to each other.

Herr Kickebusch und sein Kätzchen Schnurr. Leipzig: Baumgärtners Buchhandlung, 1840. (Cotsen 5450)

There are no less than four Russian translations of Alice in Wonderland, included one by Vladimir Nabokov, so why not two radically different ones of Mother Hubbard?   Russia’s first fine art book publisher Knebel’ was responsible for the earlier one. Josef Nikolaevich Knebel is a fascinating figure, who apparently had no scruples about issuing unauthorized reprints of famous modern Western European picture books like Elsa Beskov’s Olles skifard and Tomtebobarnen.  There are no clues in  Knebel’ translation of Mother Hubbard, Babushka Zabavushka i sobachka Bum [The Jolly Grandma and her Little Dog Boom], as to who wrote the text or drew the pictures.  The mystery author was Raisa Kudasheva (1878-1964), who also translated the Knebel rip-off of one of the Beskow picture books.  While the illustrations are in the unmistakable style of W. W. Denslow, whoever drew them was not copying the American’s  version of Mother Hubbard.  

Raisa Kudasheva. Babushka Zabavushka u sobashka Bum. Moscow: I. Knebel’, ca. 1906. (Cotsen 27721)

A purely Russian addition to the dog’s remarkable accomplishments is sledding! (Cotsen 27721)

Of all the versions here, perhaps the closest to the spirit of the English nursery rhyme is the poem Pudel’ [Pudel] by the great Soviet children’s poet, Samuil Marshak.  In some people’s opinion, Marshak beats the original cold and they may have a point.  To what extent the inspired illustrations by Vladimir Lebedev play into this is impossible to say.    It begins something like this:  An old lady who loves a quiet life drinking coffee and making croutons.  Or would, if she didn’t own a rumbustious purebred poodle.   She decides to get him a bone for lunch out of the cupboard, but what does she find inside? The poodle!

Samuil Marshak. Pudel’. Illustrated by Vladimir Lebedev. Moscow, Leningrad: Raduga, 1927. (Cotsen 26976)

There is no end to his naughty tricks.  This is what happens when he gets his paws on the old lady’s ball of knitting wool…

Marshak’s spin on Mother Hubbard is still so beloved in Russia that an animated film was made by Nina Shorina in 1985.  This version on You Tube has optional subtitles so the poetry and pictures can be enjoyed together by non-Russian speakers.

A world traveler, this very English bit of nonsense!