Julian Preece

K. Stuart Parkes

Arthur Williams

The aesthetic and linguistic concerns of German-language writers are explored against the backdrop of a readership in transition. Two essays examine intertextuality as a concept and as a phenomenon in the work of Christa Wolf, before the first main set (aesthetics) addresses narrative techniques (Jurek Becker, Wolfgang Hilbig, Hans Joachim Schädlich), formal experimentation (Ror Wolf, Helmut Heißenbüttel, Hanns-Josef Ortheil), allegory (Christoph Ransmayr), metaphor (Eveline Hasler), feminine aesthetics (Brigitte Kronauer, Anne Duden), and links between literature and photography (Rolf Dieter Brinkmann). The second main group presents a series of analyses of language as problem and practice: Sprachlosigkeit (Ilse Aichinger, Robert Schneider), logocentricity and etymology (Heinrich Böll, Elisabeth Reichart), and authenticity and cliché (Werner Schwab, Rainald Goetz), Ralf Schnell's concluding essay is an assessment of a situation which allows writers more freedom as the shackles of the past are cast off.

Contemporary German Writers, Their Aesthetics and Their Language

A comprehensive survey of German literary writers' political writing and involvement since 1945.

Writers and Politics in Germany, 1945-2008

These essays examine the interrelationships between literature, markets and media in contemporary Germany and Austria. A series of studies of individual writers is complemented by broader analyses of the responsibilities of the intellectual.

Literature, Markets and Media in Germany and Austria Today

Continuities in German-language Literature

Whose Story?

Roland Smith

The volume brings together twenty-five scholars from British and German universities, many of them leading experts on Contemporary German Literature, in an exploration of the processes and implications of German unification from the literary point of view. A discussion of the intellectual climate which nurtured the 'peaceful revolution' in the GDR is followed by analyses of the work and attitudes of significant east German authors; an underlying theme is the loss of identity, the loss of Utopia. West German reactions to the questions of unity and identity are then analysed, and a series of comparative studies presented. Finally, themes of importance for the common German future are discussed with particular reference to newer writers: environmental issues, women's writing, the changing role of the poet, problems of innovation. Among the authors discussed are Christa Wolf, Stefan Heym, Christoph Hein, Volker Braun, Heiner Müller, Monika Maron, Günter Grass, Hans Magnus Enzensberger, Martin Walser, Siegfried Lenz, Peter Schneider, Heinz Czechowski, Sarah Kirsch, Helke Sander, Uta Treder, Steffen Mensching, Bert Papenfuß-Gorek, Gert Neumann, Wolfgang Hilbig, Franz Fühmann and Botho Strauß.

German Unity and German Identity in Literary Perspective

German Literature at a Time of Change 1989-1990

The volume explores aspects of individual identity and innovation in contemporary German literature with particular reference to the implications of German unification. Approaches to biography and autobiography, cultural roots, sexuality, and gender are placed in relevant ideological and aesthetic frameworks to provide a broad stock-taking of the current situation from the individual point of view. Analyses of recent work by such contemporary writers as Strauss, Handke, Enzensberger, von Westphalen, Wolf, Konigsdorf, Liebmann, Krauss, Neumann, Specht, Jelinek, Fichte, Nostlinger, Lorenc and Walser are complemented by discussions of Johnson, Canetti, Bernhard and Celan and by critical appraisals of theatre ("Wendestucke"), postmodernism and the poetry of the younger generation in the eastern "Lander," and the prospects of an all-German literature."

Signals from Contemporary Literature and the New Germany

The Individual, Identity, and Innovation

John J. White

A Re-appraisal of Its Literary and Political Significance

The Gruppe 47 Fifty Years on

Fritz Wefelmeyer

The last decade has undoubtedly been the most controversial in the long literary career of Martin Walser. This volume presents a review of this career, going far beyond short-lived arguments to present an insightful overview of much of his work. It considers not only major aspects of his writing, covering both his literary beginnings and the most recent works, but also different, previously neglected features of his persona and his writing, namely his activity as a university teacher and his art criticism. In addition, fruitful comparisons are made with other writers, such as Proust, Grass and Uwe Johnson. At the same time, recent controversies are also considered with major attention being paid to Walser's public speeches and those works of fiction which have been seen by some as demanding the end of German self-recriminations over the Nazi past. This volume is unique in that much space is devoted to both sides of the argument. It will provide stimulating reading to all those interested in Germany and German literature.

K. Stuart Parkes

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