From Page to Screen / Vom Buch zum Film. Группа авторов
the timetable in the home. She, thus, controls time and space and hence other people’s actions. Indeed, on more than one occasion, she becomes the obstacle that prevents other characters from moving within the space, whether leaving or entering the house or moving freely around its rooms (Spyri, 1978: 71, 73 and 126).
She is essentially a repressive figure, who hinders any sign of development in the two children under her tutelage. She confines Clara to the idea of womanhood which she herself believes in and does not allow her to expand her interests or to behave like a child of her age. Bound as she is to her wheelchair, Clara is also tied to Fräulein Rottenmeier’s very peculiar understanding of childhood. On the other hand, Heidi, who is likewise exposed to Rottenmeier’s suppressive manner, tries to shield herself from the latter’s attempts to mold her: not only does the governess try to prevent Heidi from reading when she sees that books trigger in the child very vivid emotions (Spyri, 1978: 89), but neither does she allow her to show any happiness or sorrow: as Heidi herself admits to Herr Sesemann, “[weinen] darf man nicht, Fräulein Rottenmeier hat es verboten” (Spyri, 1978: 99). It seems as though Fräulein Rottenmeier, in all her bleakness and severity, cannot let others experience joy or sadness.
The gravity of the character stands in contrast to her almost neurotic reactions at the most insignificant details, which are also supported by a behavior that reveals her need to control herself and to suppress her own emotions:
Jetzt kam Fräulein Rottenmeier wieder ins Zimmer zurück; sie hatte die Dete nicht mehr zurückrufen können und war sichtlich aufgeregt darüber, denn sie hatte dieser eigentlich gar nicht einlässlich sagen können, was alles nicht nach Abrede sei bei dem Kinde, und da sie nicht wusste, was nun zu tun sei, um ihren Schritt rückgängig zu machen, war sie um so aufgeregter, denn sie selbst hatte die ganze Sache angestiftet. Sie lief nun von Studierzimmer ins Esszimmer hinüber, und von da wieder zurück, und kehrte dann unmittelbar wieder um und fuhr hier den Sebastian an, den seine runden Augen eben nachdenklich über den gedeckten Tisch gleiten ließ, um zu sehen, ob sein Werk keinen Mangel habe […] Mit diesen Worten fuhr Fräulein Rottenmeier an Sebastian vorbei und rief nach der Tinette, mit so wenig einladendem Ton, dass die Jungfer Tinette noch mit viel kleineren Schritten herantrippelte als sonst gewöhnlich und sich mit so spöttischen Gesicht hinstellte, dass selbst Fräulein Rottenmeier nicht wagte, sie anzufahren; um so mehr schlug ihr die Aufregung nach innen.
“Das Zimmer der Angekommenen ist in Ordnung zu bringen, Tinette”, sagte die Dame mit schwer errungener Ruhe; “es liegt alles bereit, nehmen Sie noch den Staub von den Möbeln weg.“ (Spyri, 1978: 53)
Similar descriptions follow (“mit strengem Gesicht … mit tiefem Seufzer … im grossen Ärger rufend” [Spyri, 1978: 55]) and they all contribute to outlining the portrait of this figure: stern, uptight and emotionally repressed. Such uptightness is also revealed in the description of her non-verbal communication, with Rottenmeier perpetually wringing her hands and clenching her fists (Spyri, 1978: 59, 71). Besides those gestures, other traits help define the repressed personality of this character, above all her incapacity to express her own feelings or let others express theirs: “‘Es ist genug’, wollte Fräulein Rottenmeier rufen; aber vor Aufregung tönte ihre Stimme gar nicht mehr” (Spyri, 1978: 65) and immediately after “Fräulein Rottenmeier saß weiß vor Entrüstung da und konnte erst keine Worte für ihre Empfindungen finden” (Spyri, 1978: 69).
As mentioned above, through their utterances and gestures, the rest of the characters in the novel also support this definition of Rottenmeier’s personality. Sebastian, the butler, for instance, often refers to her using irony (Spyri, 1978: 60) or direct criticism. He describes her as being ready to explode “Fräulein Rottenmeier sieht aus wie eine geladene Kanone” (Spyri, 1978: 65) or refers to her as “die furchtsame Dame” and goes on laughing (Spyri, 1978: 1978: 66): “Sebastian ging gleich an die Arbeit und kicherte beständig vor sich hin, den er dachte: ‘Das wird noch was absetzen!‘ und der Sebastian sah es nicht ungern, wenn Fräulein Rottenmeier ein wenig in Aufregung geriet” (Spyri, 1978: 66). Sebastian’s perception of Rottenmeier is strengthened by Clara’s father, who is clearly aware of the animosity between his two employees: “Es war Herr Sesemann nicht entgangen, dass Sebastian und Fräulein Rottenmeier sich nicht eben mit Zuneigung betrachteten” (Spyri, 1978: 94).
One of the most memorable episodes in the first novel involves the appearance of a “ghost” in the Sesemann house. During a couple of nights, the whole household is in search of whatever or whoever may be the cause of noises that are heard during the night: The source of the racket turns out to be Heidi’s sleep-walking, but Rottenmeier is positively convinced that an ancestor of the Sesemann family has come back to his home in search of something and her irrationality causes amusement among the servants and Herr Sesemann. This contrast in her personality – her being so strict and her belief in the imaginary – make her appear unreliable and fickle and underline the negative perception of the figure.
At the end of the first novel (Heidis Lehr- und Wanderjahre), Heidi needs to return to Switzerland. She suffers from a depression that is leading to anorexia1 and Doctor Classen, the family doctor, orders that she immediately returns to her grandfather and breathes the “heimatliche Bergluft” (Spyri, 1978: 99) again. Rottenmeier is happy to see Heidi go back to her mountain and her own narrative in the story finishes when the child leaves Frankfurt. She does not even consider the idea of accompanying Clara to the Alps when the latter starts to plan her trip to visit Heidi together with her father and her doctor. Although Rottenmeier claims that she does not want to impose, in the letter that Clara writes to Heidi to let her know about their arrival, she explains that Rottenmeier “shuddered” (Spyri, 1978: 157) after Sebastian’s descriptions of the heights and precipices in the Alps. Again, by trying to hide her own emotions, Rottenmeier comes across as a somewhat deceitful person, someone who is unable to come to terms with her own fears and shortcomings. In the novel, Rottenmeier is not mentioned again after that, not even after Clara succeeds in walking again. The character disappears abruptly, and the narrative concentrates instead on Clara’s healing in the mountains and on the religious and social conversion of Heidi’s grandfather.
It is precisely the trip to the mountains that presents the main transformation in the character of Rottenmeier from the novel to the screen, since in both of the animated series the governess does accompany Clara to Switzerland to visit Heidi and this journey triggers a clear conversion in her and in her relationship to her environment, most particularly in the most recent version.
3.2 From anime to CGI: Rottenmeier’s evolution in the world of animation
As mentioned above, the character of Fräulein Rottenmeier in Takahata’s version essentially replicates her literary predecessor in her attitudes and utterances, particularly in the first half of the series. As in the novel, the series makes use of visual aids to convey the same traits to the character. Dete and Heidi need to climb a flight of stairs on their arrival at the Sesemann’s house to present themselves to Rottenmeier (Nakajima, Takahata, 1974: episode 20, 02:33), she occupies the head position at the table (Nakajima, Takahata, 1974: episode 20, 05:14) as symbol of her authority in the domestic realm, and her neurosis and sternness are also an engrained part of her character. However, in episode 32, Clara starts re-defining both the character of her governess and her own personality by blaming Rottenmeier directly for Heidi’s sickness and labeling her as “inhuman” (Gonnard, Mouscadet, 2015: episode 34, 21:39) because she tries to suppress Heidi’s emotions, for instance by not letting the child remember the mountains or speak about them (Gonnard, Mouscadet, 2015: episode 34, 12:58). In spite of everything, particularly despite Clara’s refusal, Rottenmeier is the one to travel with the child to the Alps to visit her friend, once Heidi is advised to leave Germany and return to her grandfather. Once up in the mountains, the governess is unable to adapt to rural life; more than that, she aims to reproduce her timetable and behaviors from Frankfurt in Switzerland and tries to enforce her habits in the world of Grandfather’s cabin – and obviously fails to do so.
Nonetheless, her rigidity wanes slightly when it comes to protecting Clara from what she believes could threaten her and she dares to go out in the middle of a storm together with Heidi’s grandfather to find the children, who are out on an