Hartung-Gorre Verlag

Inh.: Dr. Renate Gorre

D-78465 Konstanz / Germany

Fon: +49 (0)7533 97227

Fax: +49 (0)7533 97228

www.hartung-gorre.de

 

S

January/Januar 2008

 

GERMANISTIK

IN IRELAND

Schriftenreihe Volume 1    2008

 

 

 

 

Prose Pieces
Irish Germanists Interpret German Short

and Very Short Stories

1st edition/1. Auflage 2008, 242 pages/Seiten, € 20,00.

ISBN-13: 978-3-86628-185-1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

 

Florian Krobb and Jeff Morrison

German Short and Very Short Prose: Introduction............................ 7

Jeff Morrison

Johann Joachim Winckelmann and Johann Wolfgang Goethe:
 Two Italian Anecdotes............................................................ 19

Rachel MagShamhráin

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg: Sudelbücher (1765-1799)............... 29

Sascha Harris

Friedrich Hölderlin: Über Achill (1799).......................................... 39

Eoin Bourke

Johann Peter Hebel: Unverhofftes Wiedersehen (1810).................. 47

Jochen Bedenk

Heinrich von Kleist Baxer Anecdote (1811)................................... 59

Siobhán Donovan

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm: Der alte Großvater und der Enkel /

....... Die Sterntaler (1812).............................................................. 69

Florian Krobb

Theodor Storm: Dree to Bedd (1845)........................................... 81

Florian Krobb

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach: Die Brüder (1909).......................... 89

Karl-Bernhard Bödeker

Franz Kafka: Vor dem Gesetz (1915)............................................. 99

Arnd Witte

Franz Kafka: Auf der Galerie (1918)............................................ 111

Noel Deeney

Klabund: Die heiligen sieben Schläfer (1921).............................. 119

Valerie Heffernan

Robert Walser: Lange wohnte sie nun schon

....... im Turm der Geduld (1929).................................................. 133

Hans-Christian Oeser

Bertolt Brecht: Wenn die Haifische Menschen wären (1948)........ 141

Regina Standún

Jeannie Ebner: Fortschritt (1956)................................................. 151

Una Carthy

Heinrich Böll: Redensarten (1957)............................................... 159

Regina Standún

Helmut Qualtinger: Die Ahndlvertilgung (1958)........................... 169

Eoin Bourke

Heinrich Böll: Anekdote zur Senkung der Arbeitsmoral (1963).... 177

Moray McGowan                                                      

Günter Kunert: Das Bild der Schlacht am Isonzo (1964).............. 191

Hans-Walter Schmidt-Hannisa

Elias Canetti: Die Brotwahl (1968)............................................... 199

Andreas Stuhlmann

Günter Eich: Ein Nachwort von König Midas (1968) .................. 209

Eoin Bourke

Stella Rotenberg: Chronik (1986)................................................. 223

Carmel Finnan

Peter Bichsel: Das Lob der Armut (1991)..................................... 233

 

 

List of Contributors...................................................................... 242

 

 

Review in Germanistik in Ireland, Yearbook 2008, Vol. 3, pages 201-203

 

Jeff Morrison and Florian Krobb (eds.): Prose Pieces: Irish Germanists Interpret

German Short and Very Short Narratives. Konstanz: Hartung-Gorre, 2008 (=

Germanistik in Ireland, vol. 1). 242 pp. ISBN 978-3-86628-185-1.

 

Short and very short forms of prose writing play a significant role in the rise of literary modernism in German, Austrian and Swiss literature, subverting existing genre conventions, transforming established modes of writing and creating an entirely new field of competing and overlapping sub-genres and traditions as a crucial site of literary innovation. Since the seventeenth century, short prose often undercuts the distinction between high literature and pragmatic forms of writing while also exploring – and increasingly combining – poetic, narrative, essayistic, descriptive, reflexive, and diaristic techniques. While some sub-genres (such as the aphorism, the prose poem or the short story) have attracted quite extensive research, scholarship’s traditional focus on more established larger genres (such as the novel), invested with more ‘cultural capital’ (Bourdieu) in aesthetic debates and academic criticism, is reflected in a general lack of research in the field of short prose genres. It is in this context that Morrison’s and Krobb’s collection of readings of narrative short prose pieces by Irish Germanists makes a significant contribution to international German Studies.

The editors’ primary ambition, however, is more pragmatic. Drawing on the experience of teaching German literature at Higher Education level and targeting undergraduate students of German as well as non-professional readers of German literature, they draw on the expertise of Irish German Studies to present a series of chapters on selected short prose pieces from the late eighteenth century to the early 1990s, engaging readers in the close reading of these texts and introducing them to the academic study of literary works, and of the historical, literary and cultural issues which they raise. All chapters follow roughly the same pattern. They include the full text of the prose piece discussed in the German original as well as in an English translation, then they offer introductory and contextual information on the author and the piece, present close textual analysis, and develop aspects of an academic discussion of relevant themes, techniques, traditions and/or contexts with some selected reference to research (listed in short bibliographies). Conceived as a text-book and taking Morrison’s and Krobb’s Poetry Project: Irish Germanists Interpret German Verse (2003) as a model, the volume thus also showcases Irish German Studies, combining contributions from a range of institutions and from both established scholars and early career researchers or teachers.

The focus on narrative reflects a tradition in short prose editing for the purpose of teaching; anthologies of short prose by German publishers targeting German Alevel students (such as Reclam and Klett) also concentrate on narrative. Interestingly, however, the texts selected by Morrison’s and Krobb’s contributors often reflect the overlap between narrative and other forms of short prose writing in the works of modern authors, taking textual analysis to key problems in the discussion of modern short prose at large. In terms of historical range, the volume starts with Winckelmann and Goethe in the late eighteenth century and covers the nineteenth century, modernism, and the post-1945 period with a number of authors and chapters each, while the contemporary period is only given two pieces and could have been represented more strongly. The choice of authors includes some of the leading figures in short prose writing, such as Lichtenberg, Kleist, Hebel, Robert Walser, Kafka, Canetti and Eich, while some equally important writers in the field (such as Altenberg, Musil, Benjamin, Kaschnitz, or Botho Strauß) are missing. However, readings of pieces by less prominent authors of short prose (such as Klabund, Qualtinger or Rotenberg) are in themselves evidence of the richness of the field and open up interesting avenues of both literary and cultural discussion. The volume is particularly successful in exploring the ‘calendar story’ (Kalendergeschichte) and its legacy, a genre which epitomizes the close relationship between specific forms of short prose and the media in which they are published, as discussed in the editors’ introduction. The calendar story also questions the boundary between ‘high’ literature and popular forms, as does the fairy tale (Märchen), which also features prominently and illustrates the significance of oral traditions for short prose, highlighted by the editors.

Similar to poetry, very short pieces of prose lend themselves naturally to the approach chosen in this volume, i.e. the combination of close readings of individual pieces with a selective discussion of wider themes and contexts. Some contributions are particularly successful in using this format, at times taking this text-book approach to research level. In the first chapter, Morrison’s discussion of two Italian anecdotes by Winckelmann and Goethe raises key issues in German Classicism, highlighting the significance of aesthetic experience in late eighteenth century thought. Bedenk’s reading of one of Kleist’s famous anecdotes combines in-depth textual analysis with cultural contextualization (the history of the duel and sports), exploring Kleist’s central theme of epistemological crisis. Bourke uses Hebel’s miniature novella Unverhofftes Wiedersehen, the most famous version of the Falun mining incident, as an example of the calendar story while also highlighting the fascination of recurring motifs in literary history. In Donovan’s discussion of two of the Grimms’ fairy tales, explicit reference to literary sources and to changes in narrative culture achieve a similar sense of literary experiment and historical development. Krobb’s chapter on a small story by Storm returns to the calendar story and uses references to Greek philosophy to raise awareness of the significance of cultural history and context for the reading of literature.

Arguably, short prose is particularly suitable material for introducing students to the academic study of literature at university level. This edited volume presents a largely successful collection of case studies for the teaching of German literature in the English-speaking world. It also ties in with recent German attempts at more systematic research in the structure and history of short prose at large.

 

Dirk Göttsche (Nottingham)

Volume 2 (2013)

Regina Standún

Das österreichische und irische ländliche Volksstück des 20. Jahrhunderts

als Ausdruck nationaler Selbstdarstellung auf der Bühne: Ein Vergleich

1st edition/1. Auflage 2013, 240 pages/Seiten, € 20,00. ISBN 3-86628-465-9

ISBN-13: 978-3-86628-465-4

 

 

Volume 3 (2013)

Ann Murray

Interrogating Normalcy

Proceedings of the Postgraduate

Conference in German Studies 

University College Cork, May 2011

1st edition/1. Auflage 2013, 146 pages/Seiten, € 20,00.

ISBN 978-3-86628-487-6

 

 

The Series of the Yearbooks / Die Reihe der Jahrbücher

Order in your bookshop or  directly at  / Buchbestellungen in Ihrer Buchhandlung oder direkt bei:

Hartung-Gorre Verlag
D-78465 Konstanz / Germany
Telefon: +49 (0)7533 97227
Telefax: +49 (0)7533 97228
http://www.hartung-gorre.de
eMail: verlag@hartung-gorre.de