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| “ | Human beings...can become anything. | ” |
—Bonaparta | ||
Franz Bonaparta (フランツ・ボナパルタ, Furantsu Bonaparuta?), born Klaus Poppe (クラウス・ポッペ, Kurausu Poppe?), is a former psychologist, psychiatrist, neurosurgeon, children's book author, and junior officer of the Czechoslovakian Secret Police (StB), now working as a humble hotel manager in the small town of Ruhenheim, Germany.
Starting in the 1950s, he conducted numerous personality reprogramming experiments for the StB. In the 70s, he was in charge of a eugenics experiment together with Czech bureaucrat Petr Čapek, which eventually led to the birth of the twins Johan Liebert and Nina Fortner.
Appearance
Bonaparta is a tall, elderly man with short, combed-back gray hair, light blue eyes, a short beard, and fair skin. He has a large, hooked nose, prominent cheekbones, and short eyebrows.
When he was younger, he had left-parted medium-brown hair, and was clean-shaven.
Personality
Bonaparta is initially characterized as being a quiet, haughty, and intimidating, yet refined man obsessed with power and control. He seems largely unmoved by the suffering of the children he is experimenting on. Later on in life, he comes to regret this course of action and comes to care for the children in his life very deeply.
Biography
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| SPOILER WARNING The following text contains spoilers. Proceed with caution. |
Background
Bonaparta was born to Terner Poppe and an unnamed woman likely in the 1930s[speculation] in the town of Jablonec nad Nisou in the Czech Republic. When he reached early adulthood, he fell in love with a young woman who lived in the town. However, his father rushed in and stole her out from under him. The woman became pregnant, but left and married a Czech-born German in the neighboring town of Liberec, and later gave birth to a son (Bonaparta's half-brother). Deeply angered by his father's actions, Bonaparta proceeded to brainwash him and strip him of his identity to the point where he would eventually be unable to recall his own name.
In 1950, Bonaparta left his hometown, never to return. From there, he attended school and got degrees in psychology, psychiatry, and neurosurgery, and met his first book editor. During this time, he developed an interest for a woman who worked as an actress; she transformed on stage so dramatically that it seemed as though she possessed multiple personalities. He temporarily removed her from her position and studied her brainwaves as part of a government research project. The two of them eventually fell in love and married, and in 1962 she bore him a son. For unknown reasons, the couple split, and Bonaparta would be absent from his son's life.
At some point in time, the woman his father impregnated reached out to Bonaparta because her son wanted to become a soldier, but he required a recommendation from a Czech to be enrolled (her husband, being German, could not provide it). Bonaparta readily provided the recommendation, thinking that he could use the son in an experiment someday.
The Red Rose Mansion, several years after the mass murder, and before it was burned down by Johan.
In the 1960s, as a part of the Czechoslovakian Secret Police, he began conducting personality reprogramming experiments, and also began hosting reading seminars at the Red Rose Mansion. Coincidentally, his son was enrolled in the seminars, but the two would never acknowledge each other as father and son, and his son would eventually be kicked out of the program due to a lack of aptitude.
Around 1970, he gains a new book editor, a man by the name of Tomáš Zobak.
The eugenics experiment
In the early 1970s, he started a eugenics experiment to create the "perfect child". Men and women from around the country were selected based on genetic attributes such as physical features and intellect. Two subjects selected for a pairing were Věra Černá and Bonaparta's younger half-brother, now a career soldier in Czechoslovakia. The two were set up at a cafe in Prague in 1974 and fell in love. After she became pregnant, the man confessed the details of the experiment to her, and the two tried to run away together. However, since those in charge of the experiment had already foreseen that occurrence, they were caught in the act. The man was executed, and Věra was abducted and placed under constant surveillance until the birth of her children.
Downfall
The Three Frogs, where Věra and her children lived in hiding.
During Věra's captivity, Bonaparta began to fall deeply in love with her. His distorted expression of love included erasing Věra's past, and all who knew her - he wanted to be the only person who could acknowledge her existence. In return, she not only rejected him, but despised him beyond belief. Even during her pregnancy, Věra swore she'd never forgive him and vowed that even if she died her children would exact revenge. After he had kept Věra under surveillance in the Three Frogs for six or seven years, Bonaparta would come to feel guilty for his actions. In 1981, he cancelled the book readings at the Red Rose Mansion and poisoned the 42 others (39 men and 3 women) involved in the eugenics experiment - those who knew that Věra existed. Whether he did it to truly repent, to prove his deranged love for her, or to again keep control and hide what he started is left up to debate. Despite his efforts, they were somewhat in vain; though Nina would recover from her trauma, Bonaparta's experiments left a lasting effect on Johan and were likely what shaped him into the person he would become.
He later visited Zobak one final time. First, he suggested a story about a monster who falls in love, but his love bears no fruit. After his proposition was turned down, he left. However, standing in the doorway, he turned around and said he had a story about a door that must not be opened. Zobak asked him what was behind the door: paradise or a monster? He responded by saying that no one would never know, because the door must not be opened, therefore it wouldn't make much of a story. After that, he left, and no man named Franz Bonaparta ever existed.
Turning over a new leaf
The elderly Bonaparta.
He traveled to his ancestral hometown of Ruhenheim, where he intended to live out a peaceful life for the rest of his days under his real name, Klaus Poppe. Much unlike the man he used to be, he developed a kind heart and helped support Wim Knaup, a child who was bullied by his peers and had to deal with his alcoholic father's abuse. He even sent his son a postcard and published his final book, Das Ruhenheim. The story is about a thief who comes to a mountain village and plans to cheat money from the locals, but forgets how to steal and ends up living a quiet life while doing good deeds for the townsfolk - an obvious parallel to his own present circumstances.
In November of 1998, his paradise crumbled beneath his feet and his whole town fell into ruin; Johan had come seeking the revenge his mother promised all those years ago. At the end of the three day massacre, Poppe was shot and killed by Roberto.
Known works
- "My Garden", as Emil Šébe
- "Where am I?", as Klaus Poppe
- "The God of Peace", as Klaus Poppe (1968)
- "The Man with the Big Eyes, the Man with the Big Mouth", as Jakub Farobek (1973)
- "The Nameless Monster, as Emil Šébe (1977)
- "A Peaceful Home" as Helmuth Voss (1989)
Quotes
- "I'm not afraid to die. However, I don't know how I can atone. That's why I've decided to accept whatever happens here."
- "If only the rain would wash everything clean. Fear, hatred, sadness... But the truth is that it does exactly the opposite. It makes things swell up even larger."
- "You two are beautiful treasures. That's why you mustn't become monsters."
Trivia
- Fan speculation suggests that Bonaparta's character was based off of the Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud, as both take an interest in the same fields of study in addition to their strikingly similar physical appearances.
- In episode 56, countless books attributed to Bonaparta by his various pseudonyms are shown stored in a bookshelf. Notably, one of them is titled Loupežník a Tři Žáby ("robber and three frogs" in English) - a potential reference to the "Sophie's choice" incident at the Three Frogs. It is uncertain if these books are actually considered canonical works or if they are merely environmental detail.
References
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| Characters | ||
|---|---|---|
| A to D | The Baby • Christof Sievernich • Dieter | |
| E to H | Eva Heinemann • Franz Bonaparta • Fritz Wardemann • Hans Georg Schubart • Heinrich Runge • Helenka Nováková • Helmut Wolf | |
| I to L | Jan Suk • Jaromír Lipsky • Johan Liebert • Julius Reichwein • Karel Ranke • Karl Neumann • Kenzō Tenma • Lotte Frank | |
| M to P | Martin Leest • Nina Fortner • Otto Heckel • Petr Čapek | |
| Q to T | Richard Braun • Roberto • Rudi Gielen | |
| U to Z | Věra Černá • Wolfgang Grimmer | |
| Other Characters | Unnamed Characters | |