German Language and Literature Commons^™

The Changing View Of Abortion: A Study Of Friedrich Wolf's Cyankali And Arnold Zweig's Junge Frau Von 1914, Sabine Schroeder-Krassnow

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

With the end of the nineteenth century, women start becoming more independent, demanding more rights, making a place for themselves in society. The docile woman who is seduced by the socially higher male and in desperation commits infanticide begins to fade from literature. At the same time a new woman with a fresh vitality emerges and deals with the old problem of pregnancy and abortion. Two works which treat this type of woman are examined and the parallels as well as the differences between the portrayal are established. Although the heroines in Wolf's play and Zweig's novel come from different …

Handke's «Kafkaesque» Novel: Semiotic Processes In Die Angst Des Tormanns Beim Elfmeter, June Schlueter

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Die Angst des Tormanns beim Elfmeter is characterized by qualities which have come to be known as «Kafkaesque.» The behavior of the protagonist is unexplained, the prevailing atmosphere is one of anxiety, and a fuzzy suggestiveness informs the novel's fictive world. Yet, as with Kafka's work, mimetic or allegorical interpretations seem to impoverish rather than to enrich the text. It may well be that the primary concern of both authors is to illumine not the character of the world, but the character of meaning itself. In Handke's novel, Josef Bloch, eluding capture by the Austrian police following his murder of …

Nontraditional Features Of Heinrich Böll's War Books: Innovations Of A Pacifist, W. Lee Nahrgang

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Heinrich Böll, recipient of the Nobel Prize for literature in 1972, has treated the theme of war throughout his literary career; and in some ways his war books and stories differ considerably from those of other contemporary German writers. In fact, some authorities argue that none of his works are true war books in the traditional sense. Perhaps the most significant difference between Böll's works and the war books of most other authors is that he equates World War II with previous military conflicts, whereas they consider it uniquely evil because of the various crimes of the National Socialists. This …

An Interview With Hermann Kant, Joan E. Holmes

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

In an interview with Joan E. Holmes (University of Kansas), Hermann Kant, novelist and current president of the Writers Union of the German Democratic Republic (GDR or East Germany), discusses his own work, literary developments since 1949 in the GDR, and the changing concept of socialist realism. Central to all of these topics is the role of the writer and the function of literature in a socialist system, a question which resulted in a heated controversy during the summer and fall of 1979 in the GDR. The crux of the matter lies in the nature of Marxist theory and is …

When Sports Conquered The Republic: A Forgotten Chapter From The «Roaring Twenties.» , Wolfgang Rothe

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

After the First World War, sport experienced an astonishing growth in the successor states to the two empires of central Europe, a growth which can only be explained sociologically in terms of the general character of the twentieth century as a «physical century.» Furthermore, the intellectual climate of the times as well as the psychic state of the freshly-hatched Republicans plays a special role. That is, the enormous fascination with the «Moloch of sport» can be explained on the one hand by a non-intellectual worshipping of purely physical, measurable maximum achievements (record-mania), on the other by the America-cult that arose …

An Interview With Peter Handke, June Schlueter

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Handke comments on the relationship of his early essays to his fiction, maintaining that there is no theory of literature but only practice. For him, fiction brings daily occurrences into a new order, with the point of intersection of these occurrences suggesting a story. Handke believes there will always be a need for narrative prose which goes beyond mere reportage, and, with respect to his journal, Das Gewicht der Welt, he sees no contradiction between «journal» and «fiction.» His distinction between everyday and poetic language is central to Handke's approach to fiction. Explaining that there is no language for …

Die Moderne Großstadt In AusgewäHlten Werken Deutscher Lyriker, Hildegard Goranson

Dissertations and Theses

It is the purpose of this thesis to discuss the works of German poets who describe the large modern city and deal with various aspects of city life and city people.

Leitmotif And Structure In Fassbinder's Effi Briest, Edith Borchardt

German Publications

No abstract provided.

Die Pietisterey Im Fischbein-Rocke Oder Die Doctormäßige Frau, Luise Adelgunde Victorie Gottsched

Prose Fiction

Nach Guillaume-Hyacinthe Bougeant »La Femme docteur ou la théologie janseniste tombée en uenouille« (1732). Erstdruck (anonym): »Rostock, Auf Kosten guter Freunde« [Leipzig (Bernhard Christoph reitkopf)] 1736.

Introduction. Blaise Cendrars: A «Symphonie Contrastante.», Monique Chefdor

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Introduction for this special issue on Blaise Cendrars.

The Isolation Of An Individual : Thomas Mann's Tonio KröGer, Thomas Richard Survilla

Dissertations and Theses

Thomas Mann, early in life, felt himself to be "different" from others around him and "isolated" from the normal life that others enjoyed. He attributed these feelings to what he felt was his descent from a sound Bürger life to unsound Künstlertum.

These feelings of guilt and suffering prodded Mann into applying his introspective-artistic techniques to his own condition. He examined his own life, considered his own world and his relationship to it, and came to certain conclusions. Many of Mann's works are therefore not "fiction" at all'; he himself once stated that all of his works were autobiographical.

Polar Opposites In Hermann Hesse's Novels, Karen Lea Nead

Masters Theses

The object of this thesis is to show how Hermann Hesse utilizes polar opposites and to show how the integration of conflicting forces works in the lives of the fictional characters in Demian, Steppenwolf, Narcissus and Goldmund, and The Glass Bead Game. These four novels not only are representative of the progression of the individual, but together, they are a consecutive representation of the artist's own search for a unified self. Influenced by psychologist Carl Jung's theories regarding the process of development, Hesse portrays the protagonists in constant search of the self. Some of the characters …