Gotthelf Jeremias – The Black Spider: Jeremias Gotthelf, who had accustomed us to naturalistic stories within the Bernese peasantry of the Emmenthal (the Emme Valley), offers us here an amazing fantasy book. The story begins with a traditional baptism: during the meal, a grandfather begins to tell the story of Jean de Stoffeln, lord of the place, tyrant who demanded the impossible of his serfs. He continues with a scary story that happened in his house. This is the terrible story of a pact with the devil and an invasion of killer black spiders that decimated the village population.

Gotthelf surprises us with the violence of this allegorical and fantastic narrative, which probably evokes epidemics of plague, and which gives him the opportunity to preach the power of religion and morality against the depravity of men. 1901.