German Language Learning Resources: Literature

German writers, be it Goethe, Nietzsche, Marx, Brecht or Mann, have had a profound influence on the modern world. This iVery Short Introduction/i illuminates the particular character and power of German literature and its impact on the wider cultural world. Nicholas Boyle presents an engrossing tour of the course of German literature from the middle Ages to the 20th century, focussing especially on the last 250 years. He looks at key themes like idealism, modernism, and trauma, showing how they have imbued the great German writers with such distinctive voices.

This accessible and fresh account of German writing since 1750 is a case study of literature as a cultural and spiritual resource in modern societies. Beginning with the emergence of German language literature on the international stage in the mid-eighteenth century, the book plays down conventional labels and periodisation of German literary history in favour of the explanatory force of international cultural impact. It explains, for instance, how specifically German and Austrian conditions shaped major contributions to European literary culture such as Romanticism and the 'language scepticism' of the early twentieth century. From the First World War until reunification in 1990, Germany's defining experiences have been ones of catastrophe. The book provides a compelling overview of the different ways in which German literature responded to historical disaster. They are, first, Modernism (the 'Literature of Negation'), second, the literature of totalitarian regimes (Third Reich and German Democratic Republic), and third the various creative strategies and evasions of the capitalist democratic multi-medial cultures of the Weimar and Federal Republics. The volume achieves a balance between textual analysis and cultural theory that gives it value as an introductory reference source and as an original study and as such will be essential reading for students and scholars alike.

Sharply focused essays on the most significant aspects of German Romanticism.This volume of sharply focused essays by an international team of scholars deals not only with the most significant literary, philosophical, and cultural aspects of German Romanticism -- one of the most influential, albeit highlycontroversial movements in the history of German literature -- but also with the history and status of scholarship on the literature of the period. The introduction and first section establish an overall framework by placing German Romanticism within a European context that includes its English counterpart. Goethe and Schiller are considered, as are the Jena Romantics. The second section is organized according to the traditional distinctions between epic,dramatic, and lyric modes of writing, while realizing that particularly in the Romantic novel, there was an attempt to blend these three. A final group of essays focuses on German literary Romanticism's relation to other aspects of German culture: folklore studies, politics, psychology, natural science, gender presentation and representation, music, and visual art.

The revolutionary spirit that animates the culture of the Germans has been alive for at least twelve centuries, far longer than the dramatically fragmented and reshaped political entity known as Germany. German culture has been central to Europe, and it has contributed the transforming spirit of Lutheran religion, the technology of printing as a medium of democracy, the soulfulness of Romantic philosophy, the structure of higher education, and the tradition of liberal socialism to the essential character of modern American life. In this book leading scholars and critics capture the spirit of this culture in some 200 original essays on events in German literary history. Rather than offering a single continuous narrative, the entries focus on a particular literary work, an event in the life of an author, a historical moment, a piece of music, a technological invention, even a theatrical or cinematic premiere. Together they give the reader a surprisingly unified sense of what it is that has allowed Meister Eckhart, Hildegard of Bingen, Luther, Kant, Goethe, Beethoven, Benjamin, Wittgenstein, Jelinek, and Sebald to provoke and enchant their readers. From the earliest magical charms and mythical sagas to the brilliance and desolation of 20th-century fiction, poetry, and film, this illuminating reference book invites readers to experience the full range of German literary culture and to investigate for themselves its disparate and unifying themes. Contributors include: Amy M. Hollywood on medieval women mystics, Jan-Dirk Müller on Gutenberg, Marion Aptroot on the Yiddish Renaissance, Emery Snyder on the Baroque novel, J. B. Schneewind on Natural Law, Maria Tatar on the Grimm brothers, Arthur Danto on Hegel, Reinhold Brinkmann on Schubert, Anthony Grafton on Burckhardt, Stanley Corngold on Freud, Andreas Huyssen on Rilke, Greil Marcus on Dada, Eric Rentschler on Nazi cinema, Elisabeth Young-Bruehl on Hannah Arendt, Gordon A. Craig on Günter Grass, Edward Dimendberg on Holocaust memorials.