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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Motherhood As Performance: (Re)Negotiations Of Motherhood In Contemporary German Literature, Alexandra Merley Hill
Motherhood As Performance: (Re)Negotiations Of Motherhood In Contemporary German Literature, Alexandra Merley Hill
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
While the birth rate in Europe remains low, the role of motherhood is hotly debated in Germany—particularly in conjunction with the revival of feminism in that country. In the context of these debates, this article analyzes the representation of mothers in three contemporary novels by German authors: Himmelskörper (2003) by Tanja Dückers, Die Gunnar-Lennefsen-Expedition (1998) by Kathrin Schmidt, and Die Mittagsfrau (2007) by Julia Franck. All three books are informed by a feminist perspective, but only Die Mittagsfrau offers a new way of thinking about motherhood; while Dückers and Schmidt ultimately do not depart from the connection between motherhood and …
A Stranger In Berlin: On Joseph Roth's Berlin Discourse , Sabine Hake
A Stranger In Berlin: On Joseph Roth's Berlin Discourse , Sabine Hake
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
As the quintessential urbanite, Joseph Roth continues to be extremely relevant to ongoing public debates on Berlin's identity as the new center of a multicultural society and architecture of postmodern urbanity…
Böll And The Burgundians: Myth And The (Re)Construction Of The German Nation , David N. Coury
Böll And The Burgundians: Myth And The (Re)Construction Of The German Nation , David N. Coury
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
Since its "rediscovery" by the Romantics, the Nibelungenlied has evolved not only into the German national epic, but has come to be synonymous with Germany and "Germanness." After the misappropriation of the saga by the Nazis, the myth, as well as the themes associated with it had become tainted, like all things heralded for their "Germanic" nature, in the immediate post-war era. One of the first writers in the post-war era to again explore the function of myth and recontextualize the saga was Heinrich Böll. Böll set about to reexamine the mythic elements of the story and did so by …
Mysterious Illnesses Of Human Commodities In Woody Allen And Franz Kafka , Iris Bruce
Mysterious Illnesses Of Human Commodities In Woody Allen And Franz Kafka , Iris Bruce
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
The article examines correspondences between Woody Allen's film Zelig and texts by Franz Kafka. Both Leonard Zelig and Gregor Samsa (The Metamorphosis) suffer from mysterious illnesses which are multi-determined. Twentieth-century racial stereotypes are partially responsible for them; other causes lie in the commercialization of life in early twentieth-century society. Zelig's illness parallels the cultural trends and political movements of his time and becomes full-blown in the fascist movement. Zelig is therefore also a commentary on the cultural climate which helped bring about the rise of fascism. Kafka could not benefit from Allen's hindsight, but Kafka's representation of what …
. . . Und . . . Fried . . . Und . . .: The Poetry Of Erich Fried And The Structure Of Contemporaneity, Nora M. Alter
. . . Und . . . Fried . . . Und . . .: The Poetry Of Erich Fried And The Structure Of Contemporaneity, Nora M. Alter
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
This essay looks at the poetry of Erich Fried in the context of tensions within contemporary cultural studies. Fried's contemporaneity is linked to his status on the margins of various cultures, media, and ideologies—thus making both his life and his works appear as exemplary paradigms for the postmodern condition, with its various theoretical celebrations of "exile," "border crossing," "transgression," "deterritorialization," and so forth. Yet, at the same time, seemingly in contrast with his labile identity is Fried's rigid Marxist political ideological core which surfaces in his political poetry. Focusing, in particular, on Fried's poems directed against the Vietnam War, this …
The Past And The Present In The Early Novels Of Hanns-Josef Ortheil, Ernestine Schlant
The Past And The Present In The Early Novels Of Hanns-Josef Ortheil, Ernestine Schlant
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
Hanns-Josef Ortheil's early novels Fermer, 1979 and Hecke, 1983 have male protagonists who search for self-identity in the West Germany of the 1980s. In the process, they discover that they are profoundly influenced by the lives and experiences of their parents, particularly as these lives were shaped during and by the Hitler regime. In Fermer, the 19-year old protagonist rebels against this society by going AWOL. Yet in his geographical flight and intellectual analyses he realizes his deep emotional bonds with the expectations and behavior of the parent generation. Recognition of these bonds is only the first …
Between Female Dialogics And Traces Of Essentialism: Gender And Warfare In Christa Wolf's Major Writings, Sabine Wilke
Between Female Dialogics And Traces Of Essentialism: Gender And Warfare In Christa Wolf's Major Writings, Sabine Wilke
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
The relationship between memory, writing, and the question of how we define ourselves as gendered subjects is at the center of Christa Wolf's work. Her literary production, starting in the late fifties with a rather naive and un-selfconscious love story, has undergone a dramatic shift. In her more recent texts, Wolf sets out to rewrite classical mythology to make us aware of those intersections in the history of Western civilization at which women were made economically and psychologically into objects. The present essay seeks to locate Christa Wolf's evolving conception of gender and warfare within the contemporary theoretical discussion on …
Black And White, Massimo Cacciari
Black And White, Massimo Cacciari
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
Black and White
The Dialogue Of Absence, Richard Stamelman
The Dialogue Of Absence, Richard Stamelman
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
The Dialogue of Absence
"German Culture Is Where I Am": Thomas Mann In Exile, Helmut Koopmann
"German Culture Is Where I Am": Thomas Mann In Exile, Helmut Koopmann
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
Thomas Mann in exile reacted like many writers expelled from Germany: totally irritated he tried to defend his own identity by claiming that he was still the leading representative of Germany. But about 1938 a process of dissociation from Germany started which led to sharp remarks on Germany in his The Beloved Returns, to his conviction that German culture was where he lived and to the acknowledgement of America as his new home. Traces of his experience of exile, and a late answer on his separation from Germany in 1933, however, are to be found even in his incompleted …
In The Cemetery Of The Murdered Daughters: Ingeborg Bachmann's Malina, Sara Lennox
In The Cemetery Of The Murdered Daughters: Ingeborg Bachmann's Malina, Sara Lennox
Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature
Bachmann's novel Malina is about the absence of a female voice. The unnamed female I of this novel defines herself with respect to two male figures. Malina is her Doppelgänger, the voice of male reason which women must assume if they wish to speak at all. In relationship to Ivan, her lover, the I constitutes herself as traditionally feminine and suffers the agonies of romantic love. Though evidently miserable, the I must represent herself as content with her position between these two men, simply inversions of one another. Yet the novel also contains another story of the I which …