Briefwechsel mit seinen 'Kindern' I

At the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, four young individuals emerged from the broad readership of Karl May, who were particularly close to the writer and engaged in the exhausting press and legal battles on his behalf: the siblings Marie and Ferdinand Hannes, Lu Fritsch, and Willy Einsle. After some time, the philologist and educator Dr. Adolf Droop joined them, who had already published a scholarly analysis of May's travel narratives. These five admirers were so spiritually and emotionally close to Karl May that his second wife, Klara, referred to them as his 'children.' The extensive correspondence between the 'children' and Karl and Klara May is published here for the first time in this two-volume, critically annotated edition - as complete as possible. The presented letters offer not only important and exciting but also moving, very private insights into the personality of the popular writer. They also document the significant engagement of the 'children' for the literary 'outlaw' and their tireless, sometimes quite adventurous efforts to publicly rehabilitate the often accused and disparaged author. With 56 black-and-white illustrations.