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History of the German Novel
English, German (translation)
408 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 1984
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January 4, 2020
Published in German as Die Geschichte des deutschen Romans in 1972, History of the German Novel is the 1984 English language edition (with Hildegard Emmel's original German language text brilliantly translated and also somewhat updated and expanded by Elke Summerfield). Informative and meticulously researched, especially the chapters in History of the German Novel on the German novel of the Enlightenment (die Aufklärung) are outstanding and did as such also prove to be absolute godsends to and for me in a number of university literature courses (as well as for my Master's Thesis on Christoph Martin Wieland's Geschichte der Abderiten in 1991, namely how Wieland makes use of dramatics as a satirical tool in the episode Prozess um des Esels Schatten).
Now as I have never actually been lucky enough to own a personal copy of History of the German Novel (I was using university library copies, and the book itself is furthermore not in current print and thus sadly not all that readily available for cost efficient purchase), I am at present unable to easily reread, and will therefore just state that the analyses of the diverse novels and their literary periods are clearly and succinctly presented, with the much appreciated benefit that even undergraduate students just commencing literary analyses should have no major issues both understanding and appreciating Hildegard Emmel's interpretations and studies (since she, or rather, since both she and translator Elke Summerfield write clearly and concisely, eschewing an overabundance of descriptive adjectives and complex sentence structures for clearly disseminated information). And the only possible caveat I do leave is that since German literature and German literary interpretation have, of course, not remained stagnant since 1972/1984, there are, or at least, there might be, some minor issues with datedness, but most of the interpretations do remain both interesting and useful.
Now as I have never actually been lucky enough to own a personal copy of History of the German Novel (I was using university library copies, and the book itself is furthermore not in current print and thus sadly not all that readily available for cost efficient purchase), I am at present unable to easily reread, and will therefore just state that the analyses of the diverse novels and their literary periods are clearly and succinctly presented, with the much appreciated benefit that even undergraduate students just commencing literary analyses should have no major issues both understanding and appreciating Hildegard Emmel's interpretations and studies (since she, or rather, since both she and translator Elke Summerfield write clearly and concisely, eschewing an overabundance of descriptive adjectives and complex sentence structures for clearly disseminated information). And the only possible caveat I do leave is that since German literature and German literary interpretation have, of course, not remained stagnant since 1972/1984, there are, or at least, there might be, some minor issues with datedness, but most of the interpretations do remain both interesting and useful.
Displaying 1 of 1 review