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The origins of selected instances of metamorphosis in Germanic literature are traced from their roots in Ovid's Metamorphoses, grouped roughly on an 'ascending evolutionary scale' (invertebrates, birds, animals, and mermaids). Whilst a broad range of mythological, legendary, fairytale and folktale traditions have played an appreciable part, Ovid's Metamorphoses is still an important comparative analysis and reference point for nineteenth- and twentieth-century German-language narratives of transformations. Metamorphosis is most often used as an index of crisis: an existential crisis of the subject or a crisis in a society's moral, social or cultural values. Specifically selected texts for an...
This book presents an insightful account of the academic politics of the Nazi era and analyses the work of selected linguists, including Jos Trier and Leo Weisgerber. Hutton situates Nazi linguistics within the politics of Hitler's state and within the history of modern linguistics.
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This comprehensive survey examines Germanic literature from the eighth century to the early fifteenth century. The authors treat the large body of late-medieval lyric poetry in detail for the first time.
Volume of new essays investigating Kleist's influences and sources both literary and philosophical, their role as paradigms, and the ways in which he responded to and often shattered them.Heinrich von Kleist (1777-1811) was a rebel who upset canonization by employing his predecessors and contemporaries as what Steven Howe calls "inspirational foils." It was precisely a keen awareness of literary and philosophical traditions that allowed Kleist to shatter prevailing paradigms. Though little is known about what specifically Kleist read, the frequent allusions in his enduringly modern oeuvre indicate fruitful dialogues with both canonical and marginal works of European literature, spanning anti...
Explores the biographical and textual evidence of Russia's importance in shaping the writer Rainer Maria Rilke's aesthetic perception. During Rilke's two trips to Russia at the turn the century, he made connections with a number of important artists, including Leo Tolstoy and Nikolai Leskov, and the author traces the impact of these meetings and other experiences in Russia upon Rilke's writing. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Since the 1990s, following the end of postmodernism, literary theory has lost much of its dynamics. This book aims at revitalising literary theory exploring two of its historical bases: German poetics and aesthetics. Beginning in the 1770s and ending in the 1950s, the book examines nearly 200 years of this history, thereby providing the reader with a first history of poetics as well as with bibliographies of the subject. Particular attention is paid to the aesthetics and poetics of popular philosophy, of the Hegel-school, empirical and psychological tendencies in the field since the 1860s, the first steps towards a plurality of methods (1890-1930), theoretical confrontations during the Nazi-...
To mark the 200th anniversary of Schiller’s death, leading scholars from Germany, Canada, the UK and the USA have contributed to this volume of commemorative essays. These were first presented at a symposium held at the University of Birmingham in June 2005. The essays collected here shed important new light on Schiller’s standing as a national and transnational figure , both in his own lifetime and in the two hundred years since his death. Issues explored include: aspects of Schiller’s life and work which contributed to the creation of heroic and nationalist myths of the poet during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; his activities as man of the theatre and publisher in his own, pre-national context; the (trans-)national dimensions of Schiller’s poetic and dramatic achievement in their contemporary context and with reference to later appropriations of national(ist) elements in his work. The contributions to this volume illuminate Schiller’s achievements as poet, playwright, thinker and historian, and bring acute insights to bear on both the history of his impact in a variety of contexts and his enduring importance as a point of cultural reference.
In this outstanding biography, Ralph Freedman traces Rilke's extraordinary career by combining detailed accounts of salient episodes from the poet's restless life with an intimate reading of the verse and prose that refract them."
Articles in this volume focus on theories and histories of comparative literature and the field of comparative cultural studies. Contributors are Kwaku Asante-Darko on African postcolonial literature; Hendrik Birus on Goethe's concept of world literature; Amiya Dev on comparative literature in India; Marian Galik on interliterariness; Ernst Grabovszki on globalization, new media, and world literature; Jan Walsh Hokenson on the culture of the context; Marko Juvan on literariness; Karl S.Y. Kao on metaphor; Kristof Jacek Kozak on comparative literature in Slovenia; Manuela Mourao on comparative literature in the USA; Jola Skulj on cultural identity; Slobodan Sucur on period styles and theory; Peter Swirski on popular and highbrow literature; Antony Tatlow on textual anthropology; William H. Thornton on East/West power politics in cultural studies; Steven Totosy on comparative cultural studies; and Xiaoyi Zhou and Q.S. Tong on comparative literature in China. The papers are followed by an index and a bibliography of scholarship in comparative literature and cultural studies compiled by Steven Totosy, Steven Aoun, and Wendy C. Nielsen.