Arts and Humanities Commons^™

English Translations Of Two German All-Souls’-Day Pieces, Taro Omori

Undergraduate Student Research Internships Conference

Since the early eighteenth century the Don Juan legend was a popular subject in Austrian theatres on All Souls' Day (November 2); a peculiar custom, given that the main character is a libertine who indulges in excesses without any fear of divine retribution. One such work was Anton Cremeri's Der steinerne Gast (The Stone Guest) published in 1787; coincidentally Mozart's Don Giovanni premiered in the same year.

In the nineteenth century Don Juan gradually disappeared from the stage, but the custom of performing plays on All Souls' Day did not. Ernst Raupach's 1835 piece Der Müller und sein Kind (The …

Bettina Von Arnim And Civil Action: How To Defy Oppression By Championing Others, Tesla L. Gontjes

Journal of Undergraduate Research at Minnesota State University, Mankato

Children, cooking and church: Like most of the European world before 1900, these were “the three Cs” designated by society for women in Germany. However, some women broke through these expectations and pursued a fourth “C”: Civil action. Such a woman was Bettina von Arnim (1785-1859). A writer, activist, feminist, and intellectual, von Arnim was politically active during a time when women were delegated to domestic duties and expected to be completely subservient to their husbands. She lived during a tumultuous era of French, Prussian, and Austrian occupation of Germany during the early 19th century. Instead of being a mild-mannered …

Lia Brozgal. Absent The Archive. Liverpool Up, 2020., Aubrey Gabel

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Lia Brozgal. Absent the Archive. Liverpool UP, 2020. 368 pp.

Candelas Gala. Clara Janés: La Poética Cuántica O La Física De La Poesía. Csic, 2021., Nicolás Fernández-Medina

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Candelas Gala. Clara Janés: La poética cuántica o la física de la poesía. CSIC, 2021. 203 pp.

Joel Scott, Translator. The Aesthetics Of Resistance, Volume Ii. By Peter Weiss. Duke Up, 2020., Mona Eikel-Pohen

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Joel Scott, translator. The Aesthetics of Resistance, Volume II. By Peter Weiss. Duke UP, 2020. x + 320pp.

The Faustian Deal: What Is Good And Evil?, Jaclyn Elmquist

English Honors Theses

How is the “deal with the devil” is portrayed in contemporary films? This essay compares how the original Faustian deal informs modern-day portrayals. Thus, I examine how devils were first represented in early works such as The Faustbuch, Mary of Nijmegen, and Goethe’s Faustus. These depictions and their historical context provide the basis for my research. I compare these works to the films, Rosemary’s Baby, Wall Street, and Sweet Smell of Sucess. In the mentioned films, the main characters make deals with a devil or demon for wealth, success, or fame. I explore how the Faustian character of each film …

Emily Johansen. Beyond Safety: Risk, Cosmopolitanism, And Contemporary Neoliberal Life. Bloomsbury, 2021., Irene Gammel, Jason Wang

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Emily Johansen. Beyond Safety: Risk, Cosmopolitanism, and Contemporary Neoliberal Life. Bloomsbury, 2021. xiii + 171 pp.

„Kopfschmerzen, Familiensorgen": Urszenen-Konfigurationen, Psychotherapie-Parodie Und Sublimierungspraktiken In Kafkas "Proceß", Anna Lynn Dolman

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The thesis presents a re-reading of Kafka's novel "The Trial" against the background of Kafka's negotiation of Freudian psychoanalysis. Rather than merely employing the Freudian framework as a hermeneutic tool, the thesis argues that Kafka constructs his novel along the lines of psychoanalytic theories while simultaneously attempting to deconstruct them and question the effectiveness of the so-called talking cure by means of ironically subverting a therapeutic configuration. The starting point of the thesis centers on an oftentimes overlooked scene at the very beginning of the novel, arguing that the voyeuristic old couple across the street from K. demonstrate that the …

Riding The Bahn, Reading Berlin: Berlin In Transit(Ion) From Reichshauptstadt To Weltstadt (1871-1930), Mikael Olsson Berggren

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Riding the Bahn, Reading Berlin: Berlin in Transit(ion) from Reichshauptstadt to Weltstadt (1871-1930) is a study of the relationship between Berlin’s public transit network and representations of the city in literature and film. The ride within the confines of the city differs from journeys with the national railway, and the passenger’s encounter with urban space diverges from the perambulating flâneur. Although Berlin’s intra-urban transit system relied on horse-drawn carriages and busses until the construction of the Stadtbahn in the 1880s, the number of passengers commuting and traveling in and around Berlin grew exponentially each year between the 1870s to the …

Mette Leonard Høeg, Editor. Literary Theories Of Uncertainty. Bloomsbury, 2021., Samantha Lepak

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Mette Leonard Høeg, editor. Literary Theories of Uncertainty. Bloomsbury, 2021. xi + 295 pp.

Stephen Ross, Editor. Modernism, Theory, And Responsible Reading: A Critical Conversation. Bloomsbury Academic, 2022., Anne Cunningham

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Stephen Ross, editor. Modernism, Theory, and Responsible Reading: A Critical Conversation. Bloomsbury Academic, 2022. 239 pp

Jim T. Reed. Genesis: The Making Of Literary Works From Homer To Christa Wolf. Camden House, 2020., Chiedozie M. Uhuegbu

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Jim T. Reed. Genesis: The Making of Literary Works from Homer to Christa Wolf. Camden House, 2020. 301 pp.

Jacqueline Vansant. Austria Made In Hollywood. Camden House, 2019., Jason Doerre

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Jacqueline Vansant. Austria Made in Hollywood. Camden House, 2019. 196 pp.

Werwolf, Weswolfs, Wemwolf, Wenwolf: Gender, Morality, And Transformation In Annette Von Droste-Hülshoff’S “Der Loup Garou” (1860), Hasol Yu

University Honors Theses

Werewolves have long populated Western culture, forming a particularly close relationship with Germany through their impact on fairy tales, psychology, and literature, with works such as Steppenwolf (Hermann Hesse, 1927) and Der Wehrwolf (Hermann Löns, 1910) eventually becoming international bestsellers.

Less widely recognized, however, is Annette von Droste-Hülshoff's "Der Loup Garou" published in 1860 in the collection, Letzte Gaben. This nine-stanza poem depicts a tale of a savage beast with white fur and twisted eyes that is told to the mischievous children Pierrot and Caton in hopes that it keeps them pious and obedient on a cold night. At first …

Spring Awakening: A Midwest Children's Tragedy, Lena Nighswander

Honors Projects

Spring Awakening: A Midwest Children's Tragedy is a new play that takes up the issues of adaptation, translation, and temporality in regards to Frank Wedekind's Frühlingserwachen, a play infamous in its revelry in controversy and unflinching nature in the face of social issues many would prefer to ignore. Several modern adaptations of the original text exist, but none have utilized the 2020s as a setting nor have they used the fertile landscape of the American midwest as a background.

This play, set in Toledo, OH, leans into the Wedekindian tradition of cutting social criticism and controversy in its exploration of …

The Methods Of Oppression Of Women In 1800s Germany Vs. Today, Amina Taher

Senior Theses and Projects

Women have faced many injustices, pain, and struggles over time. This thesis focuses on the methods by which women were oppressed in 1800s Germany vs. today. At first, I use a number of popular fairytales, novels, and scholarly articles/books to discuss the role of women in German society in the 1800s. Furthermore, I talk about the different methods used to oppress and abuse women in modern times, mainly focusing on the role of social media as a tool of oppression. Finally, I emphasize and debate the similarities and differences between the different oppression forms over time.

Graham Bartram, Sarah Mcgaughey, And Galin Tihanov, Editors. A Companion To The Works Of Hermann Broch. Camden House, 2019., Orel Beilinson

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Graham Bartram, Sarah McGaughey, and Galin Tihanov, editors. A Companion to the Works of Hermann Broch. Camden House, 2019. xii + 278 pp.

Erin Mcglothlin, Brad Preger, And Markus Zisselsberger, Editors. The Construction Of Testimony: Claude Lanzmann’S Shoah And Its Outtakes. Wayne State Up, 2020., Michael Williamson

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Erin McGlothlin, Brad Preger, and Markus Zisselsberger, editors. The Construction of Testimony: Claude Lanzmann’s Shoah and Its Outtakes. Wayne State UP, 2020. 495 pp.

A Bird’S Eye View: Large-Scale Tonal Structures In Robert Schumann’S Four Song Cycles (Op. 42, 24, 39, And 48), Peter Kramer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Some of Robert Schumann’s most notable works are his Lieder for solo voice and piano accompaniment. Schumann's Lieder are considered some of the best compositions in this genre, engendering various interpretations by performers and exciting vigorous debate among musicologists and theorists. Robert Schumann’s early music was almost entirely composed for the piano alone; it wasn’t until 1840 that he started to compose almost exclusively Lieder and song cycles inspired by his predecessors Beethoven and Schubert. This was a prolific year for Schumann compositionally, in part due to his marriage to Clara Schumann who was one of Europe’s most preeminent piano …

Migration Meets Bildung: Jenny Erpenbeck’S Go, Went, Gone, Lilla Balint, Landon Reitz

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

At the time of its publication, German writer Jenny Erpenbeck’s novel Go, Went, Gone (2017; Gehen, Ging, Gegangen, 2015) was hailed for its particular timeliness, as its story revolves around the most recent influx of asylum seekers and refugees from African to European countries, including Germany. In contradistinction to readings of Go, Went, Gone as a narrative of migration, our article places the novel in the tradition of the bildungsroman and takes Erpenbeck’s choice of protagonist as its starting point: in asking what is rendered visible through the privileged perspective of Richard—a recently retired classics professor—we argue that Erpenbeck’s …

Twenty-First-Century African And Asian Migration To Europe And The Rise Of The Ethno-Topographic Narrative, Nelson González Ortega, Olga Michael

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

The first two decades of the twenty-first century have witnessed a rise in the publication of narratives concerning contemporary African and Asian migration to Europe, written individually or collectively, by Asian, African and/or European authors. While scholarly attention has increasingly turned to these texts, our purpose is to further investigate them from a pan-European perspective and to propose a model for their analysis as a distinct literary genre. We therefore introduce the "ethno-topographic narrative" to define, classify and systematically analyze twenty-first-century migration narratives published in Europe in relation to theory, method, corpus, generic type, individual or collective authorship, border and …

Special Focus Introduction: Migration Narratives In Europe, Farid Laroussi

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Special Focus Introduction: Migration Narratives in Europe

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Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

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Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

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Sttcl Editorial Board

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

STTCL Editorial Board

Aus Deutschland Nach Westen: Eine Analyse Der Westen-Abenteuerliteratur Von Friedrich Gerstäcker, Ruby Hoffman

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis investigates the construction of masculinity and its role in the construction of the image of America in two books by Friedrich Gerstäcker (Flußpiraten des Mississipi and Streif- und Jagdzüge durch die Vereinigten Staaten Nord-Amerikas). The portrayal of men in these books reflects a largely traditional and hegemonic masculinity, but it contains a number of nuances that complicate that model. With particular attention to the interaction of this masculinity and nature in the American backwoods, a particular image of a successful, real, American man becomes visible. This thesis analyzes how Gerstäcker’s outsider (German)—but immersed—perspective produces a familiar …

The Other Side Of Silence: The Productive Limits Of Human Awareness And The Novel, Aven Elaina Williams

Senior Projects Spring 2022

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Unraveling Paradise: Colonialism And Disguise In German Language Literature, Brigita Kant

Honors Projects

For centuries, the Pacific Islands have been disguised by Europeans through the trope of “island paradise." Despite Europe’s role in bringing colonization and racial oppression to Oceania, the dominant narrative has been that Pacific Islanders lead simple lives, untouched from the complicated aspects of the “modern world.” This narrative has enabled White outsiders to fantasize about the Pacific Islands as a place for personal denial of Western social conventions, simultaneously allowing White European men to fetishize and possess Pacific Island culture and identity. My honors project will closely examine three fictional German language texts- Haimotochare (1819), Der Papalagi (1920) …

Transforming The Humane: Human/Animal Relationships In Marlen Haushofer’S Die Wand And Franz Kafka’S Die Verwandlung, Joosep R. Vorno

Honors Projects

In this project, I investigate Franz Kafka’s Die Verwandlung (1915) and Marlen Haushofer’s Die Wand (1963) through a magic realist interpretive strategy. I identify how, as a result of a mysterious opening premise, the two texts accomplish a human/animal transformation in the protagonists. While the transformations differ in several aspects, even at times being direct opposites, the way in which the characters navigate their new nonhuman selves poses many important questions about care and humaneness, the human condition, and social and familial structures. By drawing on discussions of magic realism – from its roots in Weimar German art criticism, its …

Thirty-Fourth Annual Bibliography 2020 (Mike Lützeler Contemporary German Literature Collection), Walter Schlect, Adeline Bauder, Paul Michael Lützeler

University Libraries Publications

The 34th bibliography of 734 volumes added to Washington University Libraries' Mike Lützeler Contemporary German Literature Collection. All published in 2020, these acquisitions include novels, poetry, short story collections, graphic novels, essays, autobiographical works, and literary and cultural periodicals from publishers in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Organized by author or editor, the bibliography includes local call numbers as well as subject and genre descriptors. This Collection serves as the research arm for the Department of Germanic Languages and Literature's Max Kade Center for Contemporary German Literature. A bibliography of items added the previous year is compiled each year …