Literary Nationalism in German and Japanese «Germanistik» (Berkeley Insights in Linguistics and Semiotics #78) (Hardcover)

Literary Nationalism in German and Japanese «Germanistik» (Berkeley Insights in Linguistics and Semiotics #78) Cover Image
By Irmengard Rauch (Editor), Lee M. Roberts
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This is book number 78 in the Berkeley Insights in Linguistics and Semiotics series.

Description

Literary Nationalism in German and Japanese Germanistik traces the convergence of German and Japanese metaphors for national literary spirit through the academic study of the German language and literature in Germanistik. Early notions of a spiritual link to the national literary tradition allowed speakers of German to imagine their unity before the existence of the modern German state, but the concept for spirit also gained various nuances in the works of such writers as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the Brothers Grimm, E.T.A. Hoffmann, and Hermann Hesse. Moreover, throughout the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century, scholars and thinkers increasingly equated literary spirit with the psychology of the German nation. Against the background of these developments, the slogans of university students who burned books of so-called un-German spirit in 1933 gained a particularly ominous meaning. Interestingly, for Japanese contemplating German literature in the late nineteenth century, the native idea of national literary spirit was one of many concepts that differed from their German counterparts. However, skilled writers and translators like Mori Ōgai invested old words with new meanings, and by the 1930s Japanese scholars of Germanistik had not only documented the discourse on German national literary spirit but also deemed it synonymous with the spirit of Japan's own tradition.

About the Author

The Author: Lee M. Roberts is Assistant Professor of German Language and Literature at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne. He received his Ph.D. in German from the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests include East-West literary relations, the literature of fascism, and comparative Germanistik. He edited the volume of essays Germany and the Imagined East (2005).


Product Details
ISBN: 9781433109348
ISBN-10: 1433109344
Publisher: Peter Lang Inc., International Academic Publi
Publication Date: June 30th, 2010
Pages: 233
Language: English
Series: Berkeley Insights in Linguistics and Semiotics
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