Memory in German Romanticism: Imagination, Image, Reception 9781032319841, 9781032319865, 9781003312239

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Memory in German Romanticism

Memory in German Romanticism treats memory as a core element in the production and reception of German art and literature of the Romantic era. The contributors explore the artistic expression of memory under the categories of imagination, image, and reception. Romantic literary aesthetics raises the subjective imagination to a level of primary importance for the creation of art. It goes beyond challenging reason and objectivity, two leading intellectual faculties of eighteenth-century Enlightenment, and instead elevates subjective invention to form and sustain memory and imagination. Indeed, memory and imagination, both cognitive functions, seek to assemble the elements of one’s own experience, either directed toward the past (memory) or toward the future (imagination), coherently into a narrative. And like memories, images hold the potential to elicit charged emotional responses; those responses live on through time, becoming part of the spatial and temporal reception of the artist and their work. While imagination generates and images trigger and capture memories, reception creates a temporal-spatial context for art, organizing it and rendering it “memorable,” both for good and for bad. Thus, through the categories of imagination, image, and reception, this volume explores the phenomenon of German Romantic memory from different perspectives and in new contexts. Christopher R. Clason is Professor Emeritus at Oakland University, with research interests in Medieval epic poetry (especially in Gottfried von Straßburg’s Tristan und Isolde) and German Romantic prose, particularly in the novels of E.T.A. Hoffmann. He is past president of the International Tristan Society and the International Conference on Romanticism. Joseph D. Rockelmann is Teaching Assistant Professor of German at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, with research interests in German Romanticism, Ludwig Tieck, and Ekphrasis studies. Publications include Ludwig Tieck’s Skillful Study of the Mind (2018), and “The Sociohistorical and Gendered Implications of Gazing Tenderly in Ludwig Tieck’s Liebeszauber” (2021). Christina M. Weiler is Teaching Assistant Professor of German at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research focuses on German literature, culture, and philosophy of the long eighteenth century in a comparative and interdisciplinary framework, with a particular interest in metaphor, cognition, and environmental studies.

Routledge Studies in Nineteenth Century Literature

The Forgotten Alcott Essays on the Artistic Legacy and Literary Life of May Alcott Nieriker Edited by Azelina Flint and Lauren Hehmeyer The Vampire in Nineteenth-Century Literature A Feast of Blood Edited by Brooke Cameron and Lara Karpenko Wilkie Collins The Complete Fiction Stephen Knight Jane Austen and the Ethics of Life Brett Bourbon The Significance of Fabrics in the Writings of Elizabeth Gaskell Material Evidence Amanda Ford Cultures and Literatures in Dialogue The Narrative Construction of Russian Cultural Memory Elena Bollinger Memory in German Romanticism Imagination, Image, Reception Edited by Christopher R. Clason, Joseph D. Rockelmann, and Christina M. Weiler For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge. com/Routledge-Studies-in-Nineteenth-Century-Literature/book-series/ RSNCL

Memory in German Romanticism Imagination, Image, Reception Edited by Christopher R. Clason, Joseph D. Rockelmann, and Christina M. Weiler

First published 2023 by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 and by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2023 selection and editorial matter, Christopher R. Clason, Joseph D. Rockelmann, and Christina M. Weiler; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Christopher R. Clason, Joseph D. Rockelmann, and Christina M. Weiler to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. ISBN: 978-1-032-31984-1 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-31986-5 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-31223-9 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239 Typeset in Sabon by SPi Technologies India Pvt Ltd (Straive)

To the Memory of Professor Frederick Burwick 1936–2022

Contents

Acknowledgments Notes on Contributors

ix x

Introduction: Memory in German Romanticism: Imagination, Image, Reception

1

CHRISTOPHER R. CLASON, JOSEPH D. ROCKELMANN, AND CHRISTINA M. WEILER

PART I

Imagination 21 1 Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma: Kleist’s Memory Games

23

STEVEN R. HUFF

2 Hoffmann’s “Sandmann,” Henri Bergson, and the Matter of Memory

48

JULIAN KNOX

3 Memory, Fact, and Fiction: Imaginative Biographical Representation in the Novels of E.T.A. Hoffmann

70

CHRISTOPHER R. CLASON

PART II

Image 93 4 Memory and Self-Reflection in Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring’s Fairy Tale “Der Greis im Felsen” (1800) 95 CHRISTINA M. WEILER

viii Contents

5 The Memorialization of the Aesthetic and the Aestheticization of Memory: Reading the Hermit in Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen 117 ROBERT E. MOTTRAM

6 The Effect of Memory Embellishments on Reality in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “Des Vetters Eckfenster”

138

JOSEPH D. ROCKELMANN

7 Images for Memories: From Ekphrasis to Excess of Memory in German Romantic Literature

157

BEATE I. ALLERT

PART III

Reception 181 8 The Failure of Social Memory to Validate the Icelandic Translation of “Der blonde Eckbert” (1835)

183

SHAUN F.D. HUGHES

9 Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials: Cultural Memory and Heinrich Heine 210 BARTELL BERG

10 No Mass or Kaddish: The Forgotten Poet in Heinrich Heine’s Late Poetry

233

RICARDO QUINTANA-VALLEJO

Index

258

Acknowledgments

The editors would like to express their deep gratitude to the President of the International Conference on Romanticism, Larry Peer of Brigham Young University, as well as the Executive Director, Jennifer Law-Sullivan of Oakland University, for their help and support in making this project come to fruition. We also wish to thank Thomas Schmid of the University of Texas at El Paso for his great hospitality and expertise in organizing and staging the International Conference on Romanticism in 2017. Finally, we would like to express our deep appreciation to Stacey L. Hahn of Oakland University for her unwavering support of our project. In March 2022, the editors received the unbearably sad news that our beloved colleague, Fred Burwick, had passed away unexpectedly. Everyone who knew Fred was privileged to enjoy his intelligence, sharp wit, and friendship, which we will miss deeply and always. Thus, we wish to dedicate this volume to Fred’s memory.

Notes on Contributors

Beate I. Allert is Professor of German, Comparative Literature, and Film Studies and Director of Comparative Literature at Purdue University. Her coedited volume Alexander von Humboldt: Perceiving the World is forthcoming. Publications include G.E. Lessing: Poetic Constellations between the Visual and the Verbal (2018). She is a former President of the International Herder Society. Bartell Berg is Associate Professor of German and Director of Core Assessment at the University of Southern Indiana. He teaches courses on German language and culture as well as second language acquisition. His primary research areas include German and Austrian literature of the long nineteenth century as well as language pedagogy. Christopher R. Clason is Professor Emeritus at Oakland University, with research interests in Medieval epic poetry (especially in Gottfried von Straßburg’s Tristan und Isolde) and German Romantic prose, particularly in the novels of E.T.A. Hoffmann. He is past president of the International Tristan Society and the International Conference on Romanticism. Steven R. Huff has taught since 1987 at Oberlin College, where he is a professor of German and former chair of the German Department. In addition to a monograph and essays on Kleist, he has published numerous articles on Goethe, the Baroque, and the relationship between music and literature. Shaun F.D. Hughes is Professor of English at Purdue University. His most recent publication is: “‘Who is Selkolla and what is she?’: Disentangling Traditions in Guðmundar sǫ gur byskups,” Sainthood, Scriptoria, and Secular Erudition in Medieval and Early Modern Scandinavia, edited by Dario Bullitta and Natalie M. Van Deusen (2022). Julian Knox is an Assistant Professor of English at Georgia College, where he teaches classes on English and European Romanticism, the Global Eighteenth Century, and Victorian Literature. He has published

Notes on Contributors  xi articles on Coleridge, E.T.A. Hoffmann, Romantic life-writing, Black Metal and Romanticism, and most recently, Berlin-period David Bowie and Trans-European Romanticism. Robert E. Mottram is Visiting Assistant Professor of German Studies at Whitman College. He is the co-editor of Assembly and its Other in German Romantic Literature and Thought: The Inexhaustible Gathering and his article, “Stifter’s Realism and the Avant-Garde,” has been published in Colloquia Germanica. Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo is Assistant Professor of English at Rhode Island College. He is the author of Children of Globalization: Diasporic Coming-of-Age Novels in Germany, England, and the United States (Routledge, 2021). Recent publications study the formation of young characters in multicultural/LGBTQ+ literature and appear in Literary Geographies and Norteamérica. Joseph D. Rockelmann is Teaching Assistant Professor of German at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, with research interests in German Romanticism, Ludwig Tieck, and Ekphrasis studies. Publications include Ludwig Tieck’s Skillful Study of the Mind (2018), and “The Sociohistorical and Gendered Implications of Gazing Tenderly in Ludwig Tieck’s Liebeszauber” (2021). Christina M. Weiler is Teaching Assistant Professor of German at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research focuses on German literature, culture, and philosophy of the long eighteenth century in a comparative and interdisciplinary framework, with a particular interest in metaphor, cognition, and environmental studies.

Introduction Memory in German Romanticism: Imagination, Image, Reception Christopher R. Clason, Joseph D. Rockelmann, and Christina M. Weiler I.1 Memory Studies—An Interdisciplinary Endeavor For the past half century numerous academic disciplines, spanning the sciences and the humanities, have taken ever more interest in “memory studies” (Erll and Nünning 3, Rennie 259). Researchers have attempted to understand and explore the process of remembering as a realm of the human mind and/or brain, the former as a function of thought activity and the latter as an anatomical/physiological phenomenon. As far as elementary, essential definitions of “memory” are concerned, however, researchers have had little success in formulating one that includes “individual mental processes, myths, memorials, debates about the past, autobiographies, and families looking at snapshots” (Erll 2011, 6), in short, the myriad objects and actions one connotes by the term “memory,” and that still affords a meaningful and useful context for such widely diverse activities. Literary memory has been explained in several ways. Perhaps the most useful of these was developed by Nicolas Pethes and Jens Ruchatz, stating that memory is essentially a “discursive construct” (13); in this context, “memory” is constituted by an inner, subjective narrative brought to consciousness, of what one has experienced in past time, with the emphasis placed directly on the memory-narrative as an aesthetic creation and a communication.1 The connection with such a narrative has proven particularly interesting for scholars concerned with how authors and “rememberers” (Ender 3) construct their versions of experiencing the past, and to what extent the related material discloses some measure of objective reality, or if it merely recounts subjective experience selectively. One may indeed ask if recollections are capable of attaining “objectivity” at all. As we will see, the process of remembering may be closely related to the practice of imagining, and as such runs a close parallel to aesthetically (as opposed to psychologically) determined narrative forms. In whichever way one describes memory, it is clear that its operation lies at the very center of thought activity. Among most scholars, literary or otherwise, who explore the role of memory, the cognitive practice of DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-1

2  Christopher R. Clason et al. recollection is crucially important in virtually all exercises of the conscious mind. Indeed, remembering furnishes the greatest part of the elementary material used in the thought processes of humans and other conscious beings, encompassing all forms of education and psychological development, and it plays a fundamental role in the performance of profession, culture, and family. When one reexperiences the past through memory, one usually considers the content of one’s own recollections to be in some sense true, or “we expect memory at least to aspire to truthfulness” (Richardson 277). The accuracy of one’s memory is generally evaluated in comparison to what “actually” has transpired, insofar as that can be corroborated through the memory of others. When the ability to remember is compromised through trauma (as in the case of amnesia) or age-related neurodegeneration (e.g., in cases of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease), tragic and even fatal consequences can result. In other words, the psychological processes of memory form the basis of intellectual and cultural existence, sociability, and human identity, as well as the recognition of what constitutes reality. In this way they form a complex and dynamic element of the very content of which literature is made. At the same time, even an excellently operative memory remains, at best, epistemologically suspect. For almost all human beings, what one experiences sensorially can be recalled “accurately” only insofar as it was correctly perceptible from the rememberer’s individual perspective, which may have been compromised in a variety of ways.2 Furthermore, the passage of time is notoriously deleterious to the ability of an individual to recall events, objects, persons, names, faces, etc. As we will see in the following essays on Memory in German Romanticism: Imagination, Image, Reception, because experiences are both received and later recalled in a narrative form, there arises a fundamental question: to what extent are our recollections conditioned by the narrative genre regarding the many steps that we take in the process of remembering? Of course, there are various possible scenarios for this process. One obvious example might include the following: 1) experiences are “taken in” as a narrative by an individual as perceptions from their own subjective perspective; 2) features are prioritized according to both conscious and unconscious evaluative systems in the rememberer and are recorded and stored as memory; 3) time and the inescapable physiological deterioration of the mind’s complex, organic storage system operate adversely on the memory; 4) when the rememberer recalls the event, they place the material into a new narrative form, different than that described in the first step above, since it now must enter a new communicative context—vulnerable to a new battery of tensions, lapses, and revisions. As a story related to a specific audience, the new narrative is part of a different historical environment, in which the rememberer must coordinate images retrieved from imperfect and constantly revised storage and compose them in a communicatively adequate structure for the intended audience. Output is

Introduction  3 distant from (and may vary most significantly from) input. Subjectivity plays a role in the act of remembering past events and thus there is a good chance that it will affect the accuracy of the recalled event. How then can one expect any recollection to be reliably objective and accurate? Yet, it is clear that memory is essential and significant for virtually all areas of intellectual endeavor, including logic and reason. Current trends in multi-disciplinary fields and methodologies have begun to show promise in fathoming how the memory operates, precisely because a plurality of fields engaged in such an endeavor enables the researcher to bring multiple perspectives to bear on a question. In the introduction to a recent volume of essays devoted to the interdisciplinary study of The Memory Process, Suzanne Nalbantian has suggested that [n]euroscientists can be limited by the demands for precision and extreme specialization to ensure accurate and complete tests of hypotheses. Humanists can challenge with large questions and bring their different perspective to help move findings to larger integrative synoptic viewpoints. (6) In this way, a complementary, data-based approach, enhanced through interdisciplinary investigatory methodologies, may indeed give the broadest view of how one brings memory to consciousness and then to speech and/or writing. Tools of science, such as reason and analysis, grounded in significant and precise measurement, can provide the data and the integrity for studies of memory that must rely on questions formulated from creative perspectives and structures drawn from imaginative methodologies.3 While memory studies have identified under the “memory” rubric a broad range of issues that have been the focus of cross-disciplinary treatments, three specific approaches to the literary-artistic expression of memory have emerged as significant in addressing the process of recollection. First, the imagination takes on an important role as the neurological agency responsible for setting the memory matter into a narrative form: it provides the individual images, events, emotions, etc. that were experienced in the past with coherence that enables the rememberer to create a narratable story of the occurrence and combine it with an emotional or logical response. Second, a basic epistemological pathway which experience takes from contemporary reality to the subject’s memory passes through the sensorial apparatus: vision, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. In literary and pictorial art, this is largely accomplished through visual imagery, although some significant texts have extended the process famously to other senses as well (e.g., Proust’s evocative tasting of a madeleine dipped in lime blossom tea, which fictionally animated the entirety of In Search of Lost Time [A la Recherche du temps perdu, 7 vols., 1913– 1927]).4 Third, the rememberer’s emotional-contextual attitude toward

4  Christopher R. Clason et al. the memory is a crucial component of the process, not only as a significant part of the memory itself but also as part of the trigger that “recollects” the memory in the subject’s mind. The editors of this volume would like to propose that the process of recollection in art can be understood as an activity involving three components: the memory-narrative (internal to the subject, arising via the imagination), image/vision (through which the experience enters the neurological apparatus of thought and emotion), and reception (the emotional context, particularly sensitive to the space/place in which the experience to be remembered occurs). More specifically, literary scholars active in such fields as Romanticism5 and autobiography6 have opened a frontier of memory investigations that focus on narrative and subjectivity, which are associated with the imagination (as a physiological function of the brain). Further, the role of vision in memory has become especially topical with regard to literary forms for which “seeing” is primarily significant, such as the drama,7 or in ekphrastic descriptions of paintings, sculptures, or monuments.8 Third, the reception of what is remembered, resolving or strengthening tensions between the recalled item and its context through the lens of the rememberer’s specific emotional responses, possesses great significance for various types of memory. For example, the emotions associated with the context in which recollected incidents occurred, the viewer’s feelings about the art-object (with its generic enhancements or limitations) intended to stimulate recollection, or the specific environment of reception that triggers emotions linked to memories within the rememberer, all have the potential for modifying (in some cases drastically) the textual narrative of recalled objects or events.9

I.2 Romanticism and Memory: Imagination, Image, Reception I.2.1 Part I: Imagination Scientists and other investigators have begun to consider the imagination itself as a physical and mental function related to memory. In order to understand how memory reconstructs past reality, memory researchers,10 especially from the fields of psychology and physiology, have turned to the thought processes associated with the imagination for analogous situations. Most simply stated, the imagination can be described as a cognitive function that enables the individual to place thoughts into a future context, and to predict possible narratives of what one might experience in future time.11 From an anthropological perspective, the development of such abilities over the course of human history has proven essential for human beings to avoid dangers and survive, and thus humans have been able to endure and to evolve as a species in the face of often hostile environmental conditions. Imagination has also played an essential part in artistic creation, although during ages such as the eighteenth-century

Introduction  5 Enlightenment (which privileged the rational functions of the mind far above irrational and emotional mental processes), its role was diminished or ignored. The Romantic era, which in Germany extended from roughly the last few years of the eighteenth century until Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s death in 1832, however, was exceptional in elevating the imagination to primary importance, by constructing a lofty aesthetic space for the development of imaginative narratives that stretch the boundaries and limits of what humans might otherwise not have brought to consciousness. Furthermore, memory researchers have claimed that, analogically, the memory constructs a narrative of what transpired in past time, as the imagination constructs a narrative of what will transpire in future time: in other words, memory and imagination are two means that the mind employs to create narratives of experience, with vectors of time pointing in opposite directions.12 However, because a product of the imagination is typically contained in a narrative of that which has not yet occurred, it remains in a strict sense “untrue,” while the memory, when “reliable,” intends truth and accuracy. And yet, as we have suggested above, “truth” and “accuracy,” with respect to memory, can be highly equivocal terms. Memory in German Romanticism follows recent trends in works on literature and memory in that it does not attempt dogmatically to theorize a unified and consistent, singularly new perspective on memory in literature. Rather, its roots extend deeply into the body of work that has already been produced by the pioneers of memory studies from Freud through the last half of the twentieth century and up until the present. Imaginative texts, images, and receptions are its focus, since artistic representation becomes, literally, the “re-presentation” of such cultural phenomena from past time, in the process of being recalled in the present. The essays in this volume intend to explore how these acts of memory with their manylayered operations and complexities functioned during and after the Romantic era in German literature and art, an aesthetic-cultural phenomenon known perhaps best for its emphasis on the creative energy of the imagination. Thus, these essays attempt a distillation of memory and imagination, of past and future, and of truth and subjectivity; indeed, the Romantic “memory” becomes a point of intersection, like other tendencies and principles of Romanticism, where polarities dissolve and Friedrich Schlegel’s “progressive Universalpoesie” realizes its fulfillment. In the ever-expanding clinical and psychological literature on the epistemological relationship between memory and imagination, two metaphors have become commonplace and serve to illustrate how other disciplines (here, those of mythology and science fiction) have already left their mark on the field. The first is the Janus face from classical mythology, the image of a single entity with two faces, which look in opposite directions, and which identify specifically the perspective of the rememberer suggested by the so-called “Janus-hypothesis” (Richardson 277– 80). This representation of memory captures not only the two temporal

6  Christopher R. Clason et al. dimensions (past and future) in which memory and imagination take us, but also the implicit “two-faced-ness” inherent in the figure, which cannot provide a single, “true” view, but must necessarily equivocate what it reports. The second metaphor, that of “mental time travel,” originates in the imaginative field of science fiction and has come to characterize “the human cognitive ability to project oneself mentally back into the past, through recollection, or imaginatively forward into the future” (Richardson 278).13 In whichever direction the projection moves, into the past or the future, the content must enter language to be communicated. The result is necessarily textual, and as such becomes subject to the aesthetic and rhetorical principles that govern the subcategory of communication we identify as “narrative.” Memory, imagination, and emotion blend to give the narrative its content, while the form of the statement is dictated by rules of storytelling, as well as the logical junctures necessary for coherence and the “time traveler’s” communicative situation at the time of the telling. What achieves expression as memory is furthermore strongly colored by the individual’s highly subjective history, culture, and identity. It is no accident that especially the materials of literary art, but also of the other arts as well, are comprised to a great extent of such components as these, structurally deployed according to how the artist’s memory constitutes them. In Chapter One, “Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma: Kleist’s Memory Games,” Stephen R. Huff engages with the fascinating, emotionally loaded, and trauma-triggering memory paradigm of Heinrich von Kleist, initially comparing it to Immanuel Kant’s more drily systematic epistemological structure. On the one hand, Kant connects perception to concepts of space and time, while “imagination” envisions its object without its actual presence. Organizing such conceptualizations into a coherent order and within a framework of past time results in memory. Goethe furnishes a second, negative modality of memory: in such works as Iphigenie auf Tauris and Faust, “forgetting” cleanses one of the guilt of misdeeds. However, Huff suggests that Kleist’s fascination with memory differs starkly from both Kant’s epistemological approach and Goethe’s more literary (i.e., thematic and diegetic) concerns. From his classical period forward, Goethe seeks to redeem his protagonists, while Kleist seems to want his own to suffer, often irredeemably. That Kleist makes a habit of presenting his characters in extremis has been well established in the scholarly literature. What has gone unnoted is how frequently Kleist employs memory in its various configurations—re-cognition, amnesia, fainting spells, insomnia, and other distortions—as literary devices, tropes, etc., to inflict trauma on his protagonists and chaos on their physical, mental, and psychosomatic circumstances. Already at an early stage of Kleist’s artistic development it is evident that his distrust of memory prevents him from embracing the allure of a unified culture through Catholicism. Yet while he always resisted the

Introduction  7 temptation to convert, he appears to have regularly recalled the extreme tension he felt while viewing Raphael’s Sistine Madonna in Dresden. Torn between remembering and forgetting, accompanied by the enticement of “Wollust,” Kleist turned trauma into an engine that would drive much of his artistic accomplishment. Chapter Two, “Hoffmann’s ‘Sandmann,’ Henri Bergson, and the Matter of Memory,” brings trauma to the fore once again. In this essay, Julian Knox considers how, in Hoffmann’s famous tale, “The Sandman,” Coppelius’ influence is most concentrated in Nathaniel’s memory and its relation to present and future life, parallel to the epistemological functioning of the imagination. As a variation on Hoffmann’s signature theme of “the Two Worlds,” “The Sandman” dramatizes two ways to theorize memory, both of which Hoffmann would have known from the eighteenth-century philosophical tradition, and neither of which he found fully satisfactory. To elucidate Hoffmann’s sophisticated thinking as well as the fascinating questions the tale poses in this regard, Knox examines the philosophy of Henri Bergson, specifically theories that he develops in his second book, Matter and Memory (1893). For Bergson, memory cannot be entirely associational, for this would conflate mind with brain, and would render consciousness merely a passive receptor, devoid of will. On the other hand, to prioritize the intuiting subject over and above matter is to understate the relation of memory to motor reflexes and, as Bergson believed Kant had done, to obscure the fact that the body—which does not store memories per se, but whose sensations and movements condition how memories are called up into consciousness—exists, like memory, not solely in space but more importantly in time. To illustrate this theory, Bergson offers his famous diagram of an inverted cone perched atop a flat plane, which reconciles intuitive and empirical knowledge. Hoffmann, as Knox argues, anticipates this in “The Sandman.” Furthermore, the diagram gives a glimpse into just how Nathaniel’s memory malfunctions. Bergson’s schematic allows us to visualize one way, at least, in which Hoffmann’s thinking on memory is never far from a reflection on trauma. In the third chapter, “Memory, Fact, and Fiction: Imaginative Biographical Representation in the Novels of E.T.A. Hoffmann,” Christopher R. Clason examines E.T.A. Hoffmann’s The Elixirs of the Devil (two vols., 1814–15) and The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr (two vols., 1820–22) as fictional autobiographies, and as two of the most “imaginative” works produced by Romantic novelists. A recurring and somewhat thorny issue in Hoffmann’s novels is no less than a question of truth: can the written product of a madman’s twisted memory or the unabashedly egotistical scribblings of a literary tomcat provide an accurate account of their lives and deeds? To what extent does either text represent veracity, or are the novels merely exercises in grotesque and imaginative deception of the reader? By its very nature as writing about one’s own life, the autobiographical text is both subjective and objective,

8  Christopher R. Clason et al. imaginative and factual. When the material that takes the autobiographical or biographical form is fictitious, another layer of doubt invades the space between the reader’s suspension of disbelief and the text. Yet, if the fictional representation of life is to succeed aesthetically, it must resemble reality sufficiently to enable the reader to suspend disbelief. The uncertainty, skepticism, and doubt in the reader’s mind is exacerbated, however, by both the form and content of both Hoffmann novels, which fall immediately into a sustained chaos due to the confusion, subjectivity, and probable insanity of the main narrator in the earlier novel, and the incompetence and negligence of the fictional author and editor of the latter. Mistakes, exaggerations, and distortions become commonplace, and the fictional editors beg the readers’ indulgence again and again. Perhaps more than in any other genre of literature, autobiography must perform a balancing act between imagination and memory in a manner that entertains the reader while not violating the reader’s suspension of disbelief. Examining how Hoffmann treats the dynamics of memory and imagination as a theme in the two novels, Clason’s essay brings the imagination, as a Romantic locus of supreme creativity and artistry, as well as an object of study by modern researchers in the psychology of memory, into sharp focus. I.2.2 Part II: Image When one gazes at images such as sculptures and paintings, memories influence what we see, and that which is seen triggers positive and negative memories and emotions. Timea Partos asserts, “Like all human abilities and traits, there are individual differences in visual perception. Anecdotally, these can lead to seeing different things in a cloud-filled sky and appreciating particular forms of abstract art” (2). Thus, it is scarcely surprising that the seer’s autobiographical and semantic memory influences the perceived image.14 The interaction with and interpretation of images depends upon who is observing, and therefore the meaning and significance of the image bears the potential for changing each time a different viewer engages with it. In Chapter Four, “Memory and Self-Reflection in Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring’s Fairy Tale ‘Der Greis im Felsen’ (1800),” Christina M. Weiler discusses the heuristic potential and different cognitive processes of memory in a fairy tale by the largely forgotten female Romantic author Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring (1775–1833). Weiler highlights the distinction between conscious self-reflective and repetitive recollection and outward-directed affective remembering in the fairy tale. Vision and images play a central role in the meta-cognitive narrative, as the male protagonist gains the magical ability to see his own thoughts as personified figures. Through this visualization of thought processes, particularly the introspective recalling of ideas, the tale explores

Introduction  9 the dangers of narcissistic self-reflection and the limitations of telos-oriented, conscious recollection. While introspective, conscious recollection is limiting and hinders creativity in the tale, memories that are affectively charged—through emotional wounding and longing—hold a strong epistemological potential for self-actualization and the resolution of trauma. Family trauma features prominently in the tale and forms, together with Leonhard’s quest for self-discovery, the central conflict of the narrative. The eponymous old man—a sorcerer, who magically enhances Leonhard’s vision so that he can see his thoughts—has emotionally wounded his own family by refusing to forgive his elder daughter for disobeying him. This has led to a rift as the sorcerer has been cast out of the family unit. He has magically encapsulated the scene of the family’s traumatic wounding in a ghostly apparition. Through this apparition, Leonhard is able to enter into the sorcerer’s emotionally charged memory and heal the rift. He falls in love with the sorcerer’s younger daughter and their love restores the lost order. Floral symbols reflect this healing through affective memory and erotic love—aided by sublime nature; these symbols, which are only visual at first, become tactile when the redemptive and harmonizing power of love and memory manifests itself and heals the traumatic wounding. Weiler points out the tale’s triadic structure of loss—longing—and re-established harmony, in which affective remembering serves as a catalyst for healing and the restoration of lost harmony. Memory and aesthetics are highlighted in the fifth chapter, Robert Mottram’s essay “The Memorialization of the Aesthetic and the Aestheticization of Memory: Reading the Hermit in Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen,” which focuses on Heinrich’s encounter with the hermit. Of primary interest with regard to memory issues is the book in the hermit’s cave, which tells Heinrich’s life story before he has even lived it. Mottram attenuates himself to the central chapter in Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen, in which Heinrich, led by an old miner, descends into a cave and finds a hermit and his archive. Heinrich and the hermit become engaged in a dialogue on history and memory, the rhetoric of which is entangled in the problem of the aesthetic in the wake of Kant. The aesthetic was meant to bridge the gap between an event and its meaning, an act and its interpretation. Through close readings of their conversation as well as the hermit’s song that initially lured Heinrich deeper into the cave, Mottram shows that the discourse of memory and history fractures as much as mends the continuity between event and interpretation that is used to stabilize the subject who, traditionally conceived, is supposed to be the autonomous possessor of memory. Using as his departure point Novalis’ insights into the autonomous nature of language, Mottram ultimately demonstrates that the entanglement of memory (as well as its collective form as history) with discourse provides a powerful critique of

10  Christopher R. Clason et al. perspectives whose clairvoyance is conditioned upon the stable relationship between event and interpretation. Our sight can be enriched, as well as clouded and blurred, by the memories which are activated by external stimuli, as Joseph D. Rockelmann asserts in Chapter Six, “The Effect of Memory Embellishments on Reality in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s ‘Des Vetters Eckfenster.’” In this tale, one of Hoffmann’s last stories before his death in 1822, an older cousin shares with the narrator how the individuals he spots at the market on the street below his corner window can become more interesting to the viewer by creating fictitious (albeit seemingly realistic) biographies for each one of them, based on their external appearances and actions. The older cousin’s memories and past trauma influence how he describes the different people attending the market in Berlin. Seeing an otherwise insignificant flower girl triggers the cousin’s trauma and its deleterious, commemorative effects: he finds that as an author he has shrunk in importance and relevance in the literary market. Authors such as he no longer make an impression on their readers, and the recent conversation with the girl about the book she was reading drives home the point. The negative memories are now associated with flower girls, which also leads to a writing paralysis, since every time he tries to write he is reminded of the discussion with this particular flower girl. As long as the older cousin is excited about introducing the younger narrator to the intricacies of viewing the marketplace, his positive mood results in him enjoying the composition of brief biographies for the different people they pick out of the crowd. Memory provides observed reality with its meaning and significance, since it allows us to view more than what is there by contextualizing the image in comparison to what came before. According to E.H. Gombrich, “our eyes merely undergo stimulations on the retina which result in so-called ‘sensations of color.’ It is our mind that weaves these sensations into perceptions, the elements of our conscious picture of the world that is grounded on experience, on knowledge” (251)—in other words, our memory. The younger cousin learns not merely to reproduce what he visualizes in mimetic descriptions, but to move beyond the seen by engaging with it, comparing it with that which one brings forth from one’s memory, rather than merely glancing at it. The dichotomy between the two cousins’ viewing is apparent and becomes an example of how our past experiences, emotional recollections, and knowledge of what came before play an integral part in viewing. In Chapter Seven, “Images for Memories: From Ekphrasis to Excess of Memory in German Romantic Literature,” Beate I. Allert argues that being familiar with culturally ingrained poems, songs, and legends allows one to comprehend images better. She highlights how ekphrasis aids this process, since it is an interpretation of the observed image, a

Introduction  11 translation into words. The ekphrastic text is dependent on the writer’s memories that are triggered by the observed image, which can generate emotional responses of both desire and fear. The viewing experience is enriched through these ekphrastic descriptions because they allow the viewer to imagine how the story or battle continues outside of the painting. Allert considers ekphrasis not merely a mimetic description of an image but also an exploration of the unconscious, as is the case in the “Loreley” poems by Clemens Brentano (1778–1842), Joseph von Eichendorff (1788–1857), and Heinrich Heine (1797–1856). These poems can be considered ekphrastic texts that capture the Loreley legend in an artistic endeavor from another genre, and each poem reflects the personal memories, fears, and desires of its author’s own psychology. Allert points out how cultural iconography can modify the image since memory of it can cloud perception. Additionally, Allert highlights the issue of whether what is seen is in fact “there,” or if it is merely the projection of a memory. Thus, each author’s poem is a uniquely personal interpretation of the Loreley legend, and through such ekphrastic treatments the legend continues to grow and develop, never losing its significance. Allert’s essay emphasizes the role imagination plays, not only in memory (as we have seen in the first part of this volume), but also in viewing and reading images in the literary texts from the Romantic period. The woman whose unbearably sad song saturates the Loreley legend has been blamed for countless shipwrecks on the Rhine River. However, it has been proven, by science and experience, that the dangerous current of the Rhine at Bacharach is the real culprit responsible for the shipping accidents that have occurred there. The memory thus spawns a legend, the legend preserves memory, and both serve as explanations for mishaps in reality. Thus, the inability to differentiate between the imaginative memory and reality becomes problematic for critics of Romanticism, since the confusion results in distortion and unreliability. All four essays highlight the importance images and objects play in the act of recalling memories. Once they are triggered, memories take on a life of their own, since the mind then recalls past events which are added to the present and create a pleasant or distasteful viewing experience, dependent on the type of memories that are being accessed. Without the intercession of memory, the visual experiences of the protagonists in the aforementioned texts would be lacking in substance and complexity. The combination of memory with vision creates new images unique to each individual and dynamically contributes to further, new, and perhaps more original perceptions throughout life, possibly leading to richer and more original viewing experiences. Baudelaire was of the opinion (according to Laurie Ruth Johnson’s interpretation) that “memory is

12  Christopher R. Clason et al. crucial for originality and hence for good art” (74–75).15 At the same time, memory has the power to blur reality and disallow the observer to see what is really before them, and thus it can distort the image under consideration. Perhaps there is no more important measure for the impact of a work of art, however, than how the public connects with it as an expression of their thoughts, feelings, etc., that is, their cultural values. Many factors affect this aspect of art, foremost of which are the opinions formed by other artists, intellectuals, political figures, etc.—in other words, those whose words spark and mold the public taste regarding art, and whose judgment fashions the reception of the work. Memory plays a dynamic role in this process: not only does it inform the public taste through both individual and cultural memory, but it becomes the container for the cultural memory of that work of art. Thus, the important role played by memory in the reception of works of art and the artists themselves becomes the overarching subject of the three essays forming the final section of this volume. I.2.3 Part III: Reception Reception mediates public opinion and art. It weighs the aesthetic, political, social, and other values currently dominant in the social inventory of the former and provides perspectives on how the latter dynamically embodies, represents, challenges, or rejects them. Thus, Sir Walter Scott’s damning English-language review of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s prose,16 composed six years after Hoffmann’s death and later translated into German by Goethe (with a good measure of animosity, one may suspect),17 condemned him in the German public’s memory and banished his tales—and especially his novels—to a position at the lunatic fringe of the already suspect literary works of German Romanticism for most of the later nineteenth century. Clearly, specific spaces give rise to specific cultural values, and various geographical locations recall art and artists diversely: thus, public and cultural memory shape reception, which in turn becomes the substance of how a culture remembers artists. Memories are not only physically embodied but also spatially situated. The environment of experiences contextualizes memories, and through space, the past is tied to the present. In The Poetics of Space, Gaston Bachelard explores the connection between memories and space. For him, space, especially the domestic space of the house, connects memory, image, and imagination. He explains that “the house is not experienced from day to day only, on the thread of a narrative, or in the telling of our own story. Through dreams, the various dwelling-places in our lives co-penetrate and retain the treasures of former days” (Bachelard 5). For Bachelard,

Introduction  13 spaces are not simply experienced chronologically, but intimate spaces have the potential to hold memories and to anchor them in the mind. In our imagination, these semantically charged spaces co-exist and blend together.18 Thus, Bachelard sees space as more important for memories than their chronological fixation in a specific moment in time: Memories are motionless, and the more securely they are fixed in space, the sounder they are. To localize a memory in time is merely a matter for the biographer and only corresponds to a sort of external history, for external use, to be communicated to others. But hermeneutics, which is more profound than biography, must determine the centers of fate by ridding history of its conjunctive temporal tissue, which has no action on our fates. For a knowledge of intimacy, localization in the spaces of our intimacy is more urgent than determination of dates. (9) The environment localizes and thus fixates memories in the world. Hence, we commemorate events in particular locations and places since they can help us remember. As we have seen, imagination is an integral part of remembering, and context influences memories. Many metaphorical depictions of memory are spatial, such as that of a library, storage space, or labyrinth.19 Spaces of reception both reflect and shape personal and collective memories of events. As Aleida Assmann explains, [t]he active dimension of cultural memory supports a collective identity and is defined by a notorious shortage of space. It is built on a small number of normative and formative texts, places, persons, artifacts, and myths which are meant to be actively circulated and communicated in ever-new presentations and performances. (100) Texts travel across borders and different cultural identities shape their perception and are shaped by it. In the eighth chapter, “The Failure of Social Memory to Validate the Icelandic Translation of ‘Der blonde Eckbert’ (1835),” Shaun F.D. Hughes discusses how national contexts can change the way a literary text is received and remembered through the case study of Tieck’s famous tale. Hughes explores how the reception of this specific Romantic text reflects the intellectual space of Icelandic society and whether it has experienced a similar Romantic period, which would affect the tone and tolerance of the public for Romantic works from other literary environments.

14  Christopher R. Clason et al. The first issue of the radical Icelandic literary periodical, Fjölnir (1835), published in Copenhagen, concluded with a translation of Ludwig Tieck’s masterly Kunstmärchen narrating the tragic fate of blond Eckbert. This piece was widely ridiculed and dismissed as rubbish in Iceland. One of the translators attempted a full-scale defense of the story in the fourth issue of the journal (1838), but to no avail. This chapter investigates the roots of the controversy and the failure of the defense within the parameters of social memory. It opens by investigating those features of Icelandic society which separated it from the rest of Europe, including how it experienced social memory differently. Fjölnir and the radical young students who stood behind it are introduced along with aspects of their agenda to reform Icelandic literary taste, which lay behind the translation of “Der blonde Eckbert.” The rival newspaper, Sunnanpósturinn, published a lengthy and devasting attack on the translation which the editors of Fjölnir tried to counter in Issue 2 (1836) by means of a laudatory letter by one of their Icelandic supporters. In the meantime, the popular poet, Sigurður Breiðfjörð, composed a wicked satire on the first issue of Fjölnir, including the Tieck translation, which became widely popular. The result was a review of Sigurður’s first published poem in the third issue of Fjölnir which has become the most infamous literary review in all of Icelandic literary history. But this meant that a full-scale response to the Icelandic criticism of the Tieck translation had to wait until the fourth issue of 1838. The defense was based upon an appeal to what we would now call social memory. However, in order to achieve this, two different and incompatible categories in the traditional Icelandic understanding of literary forms had to be collapsed. This was unacceptable at the time, and it would be 70 years before the Icelandic translation of Tieck’s story was published again. Spatial contexts both shape and preserve memories. Therefore, historically charged locations are often designated deliberately as places for remembering the past. Such sites can offer room to commemorate. Memories become tangible in monuments. Thus, spaces can allow for the sensory experience of memories. Vita Fortunati and Elena Lamberti highlight the importance of landscape, urban sites, and various individual places (real but also always to some extent imaginary, and in some cases wholly so) in the characterization of communities of various sizes and kinds—and the ways in which places are tied to memory in its many forms. The interplay of places and memory (with its inherent components of historical and spatial “production”) is a central issue at various communal levels—regional, national, and global. (134) Chapter Nine and Chapter Ten both concern aspects of commemorative cultural spaces and the works and literary reputation of the German– Jewish poet Heinrich Heine. In the ninth chapter, “Urban Palimpsests and

Introduction  15 Contentious Memorials: Cultural Memory and Heinrich Heine,” Bartell Berg discusses how Heine has been recollected in Germany and elsewhere, connecting the past to the present and exploring how memorials to Heine have reflected the construction of German and German American cultural memory, particularly in the context of antisemitism and ultra-nationalism that German culture embraced in the mid-twentieth century. Berg discusses different attempts to memorialize Heine and shows how these are shaped by Heine’s reception and by later nineteenth-century social attitudes in Germany and other culturally German spaces. Specifically, Berg examines the fraught reputation of the contemporarily well-known Austrian writer, Peter Rosegger. When asked the question of whether a memorial should be built for the poet in Mainz, his noncommittal response was heavily criticized and colors his status to the present day. Nevertheless, no memorial was built to Heine at that time in either Mainz or Heine’s home city of Düsseldorf, but rather in the Bronx, New York. By examining issues of readership and self-stylization, Berg explores how Rosegger navigated the waters of nineteenth-century cultural politics and wrecked disastrously, much like the boatman in Heine’s most famous poem, “Loreley.” At the same time, Berg observes that the “exile” of Heine’s memorial to the U.S.A. confronts us with the spatial significance of his self-exile to Paris during the last decades of his life, exchanging the German cultural space for a French one, despite the acknowledged fact that he remains one of the very finest Germanlanguage poets of the nineteenth century. In Chapter Ten, “No Mass or Kaddish: The Forgotten Poet in Heinrich Heine’s Late Poetry,” Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo discusses Heine’s reception in various spatial and cultural contexts, and presents a selection of Heine’s late works with regard to collective Jewish memory and Heine’s place in literary history. A preoccupation with remembrance haunted Heinrich Heine’s exile in Montmartre; despite the fact that he had followed the letter of the law (if not the spirit) by his conversion to Protestantism while still in Germany, he was forced to exchange his home space for that of Paris. Would his German cultural heritage disown him for his self-imposed exile and Jewish identity, and would the French even care about his work and reputation? In his late poem “Gedächtnißfeyer” (“Commemoration”), Heine asserts that no Mass would be sung or Kaddish said the day of his death. His late poetry, riddled with sardonic irony and caustic humor, addressed the question of oblivion for the victim of rejection and discrimination. Thus, Quintana-Vallejo discusses some of Heine’s late works against the backdrop of his outsider status as an exile and a Jew. The question of which nation or identity would finally claim him becomes torturous for an outsider like Heine, who was estranged in numerous contexts, perhaps even exiled from the space of his own body by the pain of the paralyzing

16  Christopher R. Clason et al. disease that eventually would take his life. From his “Matrazengruft” (“mattress-grave”), he came to the bitter realization, expressed in his late poetry, that obscurity might become his fate.

Notes 1 Thus, Astrid Erll (2011) claims that “memories are not objective images of past perceptions, even less of a past reality. They are subjective, highly selective reconstructions, dependent on the situation in which they are recalled… [i]ndividual and collective memories are never a mirror image of the past, but rather an expressive indication of the needs and interests of the person or group doing the remembering in the present. As a result, memory studies directs its interest not toward the shape of the remembered pasts, but rather toward the particular presents of the remembering” (8); and Evelyne Ender in Architects of Memory: Literature, Science, and Autobiography defines memory searching by “the Proustian subject” as “a type of mental activity that occupies every one of us, provided our brains and minds are healthy: he produces a story, or rather multiple stories—each of them a memory—that tell of his encounters with the world … Proustian memory is inherently subjective, qualitative as well as dynamic, and it gives prominence to the person who does the remembering” (38–39). Thus, Ender introduces the key concepts of subjectivity and narrative in memory. 2 Terms such as “correct,” “accurate,” and “objective” must be considered relative, since in this context they are dependent upon the perceivers’ organs of perception, subjective perspectives, and the categories of human thought—as Kant famously opined in his Critiques. 3 See Nalbatian’s “Introduction” (The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives, ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James McClelland [Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011, 1–26]), which grounds this perspective; later in the volume The Memory Process, the advantages of multi-disciplinary approaches to memory studies are further developed and illustrated with respect to literature and literary criticism in two essays, Alan Richardson, “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Fiction,” 277–96, and John Burt Foster, Jr., “Memory in the Literary Memoir,” 297–313. 4 See Evelyne Ender, Architexts of Memory, 22–45. 5 Richardson’s essay “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Fiction” has been foundational for these studies in calling out recent developments regarding the parallels between the physiology of memory and imagination and elements of Romantic narrative, (auto)biographical recollections, and subjectivity. 6 See in this regard especially Ender, 1–21. 7 See for example, Attilio Favorini, “Memory in Theater: The Scene is Memory,” in Nalbantian, The Memory Process, 315–34. 8 In this regard, please see the essay by David Freedberg, “Memory in Art: History and the Neuroscience of Response,” in Nalbantian, The Memory Process, 337–58, as well as Ender, 46–62. 9 The space associated with cultural memory, which filters recollections through the specific emotional lens of a cultural group’s value system, is particularly relevant; see, for example, Astrid Erll and Ansgar Nünning, eds., in collab. with Sara B. Young, A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies (Berlin and New York: Walther de Gruyter, 2010), 19–74. 10 We are using the expression “memory researchers” consciously as a term of compromise among designations for those who do research in various fields

Introduction  17 and from various perspectives because of its extremely interdisciplinary nature; thus, the term includes scientists, psychologists, literary scholars, historians, and a host of other researchers whose focus is on memory. 11 It is important to note here that the imagination is the function of human psyche most closely aligned with Romantic literature; in the thirteenth chapter of his Biographia Literaria, Samuel Taylor Coleridge distinguishes between a “primary” imagination, an “agency of perceiving and learning” (Engell 343) and a “secondary” imagination, a dynamic and creative process relying for its materials on the primary imagination (e.g., memory, perception, etc.); but deconstructing and reconstructing them, producing new and original ideas and images, “the shaping force behind all truly great works of art” (Richardson 282–84). 12 See Yadin Dudai and Mary Carruthers, “The Janus face of Menmosyne,” Nature 434 (March 31, 2005): 567, whose metaphorical coining that “Mnemosyne has a Janus face, looking to both time past and time future,” happily denotes not only the dual direction of the thought process but also something of its suspect nature, that its products are perhaps not ultimately trustworthy. 13 As Richardson points out (292n3), Thomas Suddendorf and Michael Corballis were responsible for coining the phrase “mental time travel” in “The Evolution of Foresight: What is Mental Time Travel, and Is It Unique to Humans?” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30 (2007): 299. 14 “The meaning that is imposed can depend on our internal templates of prototypical stimuli, our expectations and learned probabilities about the visual environment, contextual cues or prior visual input” (Partos 2). 15 According to Laurie Ruth Johnson’s analysis, Baudelaire placed a heavy emphasis on the function of memory in modern art: “[Baudelaire] states that the aesthetic discourse that has displaced classical poetics by the end of the eighteenth century replaces imitation with memory. This discourse maintains that the truth-content of art can only be revealed via memory, rather than through imitation. In Baudelaire’s analysis, then, memory is crucial for originality and hence for good art” (74–75). 16 See Sir Walter Scott, “Novels of Ernest Theodore Hoffmann.” 17 Goethe’s translation, although sometimes considered somewhat moderating, nevertheless introduced the German public to Scott’s scathing perspective on Hoffmann, and on all such “Schauerliteratur”; see Hennig, 375–77, and Nehring, 329–30. 18 This layering of memories connected to space reaches beyond the personal life. As Schindel and Colombo explain, “[s]pace contains and accumulates several layers of memories proceeding from different historical times” (7). 19 For a discussion and history of the memory as storehouse metaphor, see Cornelia Müller’s Metaphors Dead and Alive, Sleeping and Waking, 49–50.

Works Cited Assmann, Aleida. “Canon and Archive.” A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies. Ed. Astrid Erll and Ansgar Nünning, in collab. with Sara B. Young. Berlin and New York: Walther de Gruyter, 2010. 97–108. Bachelard, Gaston. The Poetics of Space: The Classic Look at How We Experience Intimate Places. Boston: Beacon Press, 1994. Connerton, Paul. How Societies Remember. Themes in the Social Sciences. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989. Draaisma, Douwe. Metaphors of Memory: A History of Ideas About the Mind. Trans. Paul Vincent. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2000.

18  Christopher R. Clason et al. Dudai, Yadin and Mary Carruthers. “The Janus Face of Mnemosyne.” Nature 34.7033 (2005): 567. Elkins, James. The Object Stares Back: On the Nature of Seeing. San Diego: Harvest, 1997. Ender, Evelyne. Architects of Memory: Literature, Science, and Autobiography. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 2005. Engell, James. The Creative Imagination: Enlightenment to Romanticism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1981. Erll, Astrid. Memory in Culture. Trans. Sara B. Young. Palgrave Macmillan Memory Studies. Houndsmills, UK and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Erll, Astrid and Ansgar Nünning, eds in collab. with Sara B. Young. A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies. Berlin and New York: Walther de Gruyter, 2010. Favorini, Attilio. “Memory in Theater: The Scene is Memory.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 315–34. Findlay, John M. and Iain D. Gilchrist. Active Vision: The Psychology of Looking and Seeing. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003. Fortunati, Vita and Elena Lamberti. “Cultural Memory: A European Perspective.” A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies. Ed. Astrid Erll and Ansgar Nünning, in collab. with Sara B. Young. Berlin and New York: Walther de Gruyter, 2010. 127–40. Foster, John Burt. “Memory in the Literary Memoir.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 297–313. Freedberg, David. “Memory in Art: History and the Neuroscience of Response.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 337–58. Gombrich, E.H. Art and Illusion. A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation. 5th ed. London and New York: Phaidon Press, 1999. Hennig, John. “Goethe’s Translation of Scott’s Criticism of Hoffmann.” New German Critique 51.3 (1956): 369–77. Johnson, Laurie Ruth. The Art of Recollection in Jena Romanticism: Memory, History, Fiction, and Fragmentation in Texts by Friedrich Schlegel and Novalis. Tübingen: Niemeyer, 2002. Müller, Cornelia. Metaphors Dead and Alive, Sleeping and Waking: A Dynamic View. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2008. National Research Council. “Basic Research on Vision and Memory.” Identifying the Culprit: Assessing Eyewitness Identification. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2014. 45–70. https://doi.org/10.17226/18891. Oesterle, Günter, ed. Erinnern und Vergessen in der europäischen Romantik. Stiftung für Romantikforschung 20. Würzburg: Königshausen and Neumann, 2001. Partos, Timea, Simon J. Cropper, and David Rawlings. “You Don’t See What I See: Individual Differences in the Perception of Meaning from Visual Stimuli.” PLOS One 11.3 (2016): 1–26. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id= 10.1371/journal.pone.0150615.

Introduction  19 Pethes, Nicolas and Jens Ruchatz, ed., with the collaboration of Martin Korte and Jürgen Straub. Gedächtnis und Erinnerung: Ein interdisziplinäres Lexikon. Rowolts Enzyklopädie. Reinbeck bei Hamburg: Rowolt, 2001. Rennie, Nicholas. “Forum: Eighteenth Century Studies – Memory in Eighteenth Century German Writing.” German Quarterly 93.2 (2020): 258–61. Richardson, Alan. “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Literature.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 277–96. Schindel, Estela and Pamela Colombo. “The Multi-Layered Memories of Space.” Introduction. Space and the Memories of Violence: Landscapes of Erasure, Disappearnce and Exception. Ed. Schindel and Colombo. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. 1–17. Schurgin, Mark W. “Visual Memory, the Long and the Short of It: A Review of Visual Working Memory and Long-Term Memory.” Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics 80 (2018): 1035–56. https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/ s13414-018-1522-y. Scott, Walter. “Novels of Ernest Theodore Hoffmann.” The Miscellaneous Prose Works: Periodical Criticism, Romance. Vol. 18.2. Edinburgh: Robert Cadell, 1835. 270–332. Suddendorf, Thomas and Michael Corballis. “The Evolution of Foresight: What is Mental Time Travel, and Is It Unique to Humans?” Behaviorial and Brain Sciences 30 (2007): 299. Tatler, Benjamin W. and Michael F. Land. “Vision and the Representation of the Surroundings in Spatial Memory.” Philosophical Transactions B of the Royal Society of London, Biological Sciences. 356.1564 (2011): 596–610. https:// www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3030831/ Wägenbaur, Thomas, ed. The Poetics of Memory. Stauffenburg-Colloquium 45. Tübingen: Stauffenburg Verlag, 1998.

Part I

Imagination

1 Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma Kleist’s Memory Games Steven R. Huff

Bach, als seine Frau starb, sollte zum Begräbnis Anstalten machen. Der arme Mann war aber gewohnt, alles durch seine Frau besorgen zu lassen; dergestalt, daß da ein alter Bedienter kam, und ihm für Trauerflor, den er einkaufen wollte, Geld abforderte, er unter stillen Tränen, den Kopf auf einen Tisch gestützt, antwortete: “sagts meiner Frau.” – (II, 268)1 Bach, when his wife died, was to make arrangements for her funeral. But the poor man was used to having his wife take care of everything; so it happened that when an aging servant came and requested money to pay for the flowers he intended to buy, Bach—quietly and with tears in his eyes, and his head resting on a table—answered: ‘Ask my wife.’

Two paradigms of memory—one aridly systematic, the other aesthetic and conspicuously self-serving—stand out during the Age of Goethe. Though not directly addressing memory, in his Critique of Pure Reason (B 151–52), Kant links apperception to notions of time and space. “Einbildungskraft” (“imagination”), he says, is the ability to envision an object without its actual presence; organizing such conceptualizations into a coherent order and within a framework of time past results in memory (though Kant does not use that word). Goethe furnishes a second modality of memory, a more subversive one, that explores not the configuration of the past, but rather a complete obliteration of the past. In Iphigenie, as Orestes falls unconscious from exhaustion, the waters of Lethe “die Quelle des Vergessens” (“the river of forgetting” [HA V, 41, l. 1262]) wash away the guilt of dynastic crimes and horrors. A short nap is all that is required. Similarly, at the beginning of Faust II, an angelic choir bathes the protagonist in Lethe’s current, which conveniently facilitates Faust’s forgetting of his role in the seduction of Gretchen, the poisoning of her mother, the death of her brother, and her imprisonment for the murder of Faust’s and Gretchen’s child. “So bleibe denn die Sonne mir im Rücken!” [“let the sun stay at my back” (HA III, 149, l. 4715)], Faust says as, refreshed, he proceeds with his quest for ultimate knowledge and experience. DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-3

24  Steven R. Huff Heinrich von Kleist’s fascination with memory differs starkly from both Kant’s epistemological approach and Goethe’s more literary (i.e., thematic and diegetic) concerns. From his classical period forward, Goethe seeks to redeem his protagonists, while Kleist—who hovers between Classicism and Romanticism with equal discomfort—seems to want the characters in his novellas and dramas to suffer, often irredeemably.2 That Kleist makes a habit of presenting his characters in extremis has been well established in the scholarly literature.3 What has gone unnoted is how frequently Kleist employs memory in its various configurations—re-cognition, amnesia, fainting spells, insomnia and other distortions—as a literary device, a trope, in his writing, to inflict trauma on his protagonists and chaos on their physical, mental, and psychosomatic circumstances. Skirting the models provided by Kant and Goethe, Kleist creates a kind of hybrid anamnesis. A few examples may stand for many. Prince Friedrich von Homburg’s somnambulistic spells lead to a dangerous defeat in battle, imprisonment, a death sentence that is clumsily overturned, and ultimately to a wedding. Käthchen von Heilbronn is both somnambulant and somniloquent, with no memory of either. Michael Kohlhaas, on the other hand, cannot forget; wronged by a couple of thuggish lower noblemen, Kohlhaas—against the advice of no less than Martin Luther—holds fast to his memory and pursues his revenge and his legal claims all the way to the Elector of Saxony, and to the gallows.4 As the Marquise von O… is about to be raped by marauding soldiers, she is preliminarily rescued by their commanding officer, Graf F…, but faints and is then raped by him; having no recollection, but finding herself pregnant, all reliable memory is disabled and she falls prey additionally to rumor, to an incestuous father, and to a mother who tries to solve the dilemma by creating more false memories. And Kleist (borrowing from Molière) creates a faux-husband and thus a maliciously false memory for Alkmene when he lets the promiscuous Jupiter assume the appearance of Alkmene’s faithful husband. Alkmene discovers that she has been sleeping with Jupiter instead of Amphitryon, and that her body, and with it her memory, has been subverted into the plaything of a god. In a state of frenzied delirium, Penthesilea joins her attack dogs—kneeling next to them—to make a meal of Achilles. When the deed is done and her fellow Amazon warrior women stand shocked, disgusted and speechless, amnesia befalls Penthesilea and she must have the whole horror explained to her after the fact. These last three examples will serve as the primary focus for what follows. As early as 1801, in the pre-dawn of his writing career, Kleist hints at things to come. In a letter detailing a visit to Dresden, where he experienced for the first time the artistic and musical glories of medieval and Renaissance Catholicism, he asserts (perhaps portending Alkmene’s confrontation with the ravages of mutable memory):

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  25 Nirgends fand ich mich aber tiefer in meinem Innersten gerührt, als in der katholischen Kirche, wo die größte, erhebenste Musik noch zu den anderen Künsten tritt, das Herz gewaltsam zu bewegen. Ach, Wilhelmine, unser Gottesdienst ist keiner. Er spricht nur zu dem kalten Verstande, aber zu allen Sinnen ein katholisches Fest. Mitten vor dem Altar, an seinen untersten Stufen, kniete jedesmal, ganz isoliert von den anderen, ein gemeiner Mensch, das Haupt auf die höheren Stufen gebückt, betend mit Inbrunst. Ihn quälte kein Zweifel, er glaubt–Ich hatte eine unbeschreibliche Sehnsucht mich neben ihn niederzuwerfen, und zu weinen–Ach, nur einen Tropfen Vergessenheit, und mit Wollust würde ich katholisch werden. (II, 651) However, I found myself nowhere more deeply impressed than in the Catholic church, where the greatest, most uplifting music combines with the other arts to move the heart so powerfully. Oh, Wilhelmine, our church service is nothing. It speaks only to the cold intellect, but a Catholic celebration speaks to all the senses. In the center, in front of the altar, on the lowest steps, there was always someone, a common person, praying fervently, isolated from the others, his head bowed toward the higher steps. No doubt plagued him, he believes—I had an indescribable longing to throw myself down next to him and to weep— Oh, just a drop of amnesia, and with ecstasy I could become a Catholic. (my translation) Kleist shares with many of his Romantic contemporaries the enthusiasm for rediscovering a now idealized past, but he leaves us wondering what exactly he would need to forget in order to renounce his inherited Lutheranism or his tilt toward agnosticism. Already at this early stage of his artistic development, however, it is evident that his distrust of memory prevents him from embracing the allure of a unified culture through Catholicism. While he resisted the temptation to convert, as other Romantic writers could not, he appears to have remembered long and well the extreme tension he felt standing before Raphael’s Sistine Madonna in Dresden. Torn between remembering and forgetting, accompanied by the enticement of Wollust, Kleist turned this trauma into an engine that would drive much of his artistic accomplishment. The novella, Die Marquise von O…, the story of a young, widowed mother of two children who becomes pregnant without knowing how, is a tour de force for Kleist’s malicious play with memory. Allegedly set in Northern Italy in order to disguise the “true location” of the event, the essentials of the plot can be briefly sketched. Russian troops attack a citadel defended by its commander, the father of the Marquise. As a mob of soldiers surround her with the evilest of intentions, an officer—the Russian Count of F…—scatters them with brutal blows of his sword.

26  Steven R. Huff Der Marquise schien er ein Engel des Himmels zu sein. Er stieß noch dem letzten viehischen Mordknecht, der ihren schlanken Leib umfaßt hielt, mit dem Griff des Degens ins Gesicht, daß er, mit aus dem Mund hervorquellendem Blut, zurücktaumelte; bot dann der Dame, unter einer verbindlichen, französischen Anrede den Arm, und führte sie, die von allen solchen Auftritten sprachlos war, in den anderen, von der Flamme noch nicht ergriffenen, Flügel des Palastes, wo sie auch völlig bewußtlos niedersank. Hier—traf er, da bald darauf ihre erschrockenen Frauen erschienen, Anstalten, einen Arzt zu rufen; versicherte, indem er sich den Hut aufsetzte, daß sie sich bald erholen würde; und kehrte in den Kampf zurück. (II, 105–06) To the Marquise he seemed an angel sent from heaven. He smashed the hilt of his sword into the face of one of the murderous brutes, who still had his arms round her slender waist, and the man reeled back with blood pouring from his mouth; he then addressed the lady politely in French, offered his arm and led her into the other wing of the palace which the flames had not yet reached and where, having already been stricken speechless by her ordeal, she now collapsed in a dead faint. Then—the officer instructed the Marquise’s frightened servants, who presently arrived, to send for a doctor, he assured them she would soon recover, replaced his hat and returned to the fighting. (Luke and Reeves 69–70) As it turns out, Kleist is also playing a prank on the reader, for the em dash located between “Hier” and “traf er” signals, as we discover in the course of the narrative, what many commentators have waggishly called a “pregnant pause”: Count F… has seized the opportunity and raped the unconscious Marquise.5 During the course of the narrative, then, the Marquise realizes she has become inexplicably pregnant. She makes no connection between the Count as her gallant rescuer and the possibility of him as a defiler and the progenitor of the child within her womb. She has no memory of it. Or does she? This is the game Kleist plays with his readers and, deliciously, with his critics. In response to the negative reception Kleist’s readers gave to Die Marquise von O…, Kleist rejoins: “Dieser Roman ist nicht für dich, meine Tochter. In Ohnmacht! Schamlose Posse! Sie hielt, weiß ich, die Augen bloß zu” (I, 226; “This novel is not for you, my daughter. Unconscious! Shameless jest! Of course she just kept her eyes shut”). But Kleist is not yet finished with the reader, for there is a third possibility lurking in the narrative: post-traumatic amnesia. In fact, this latter condition, this state of erasure, does not preclude either of the other two possibilities. And while to a considerable extent the custodians of Kleist interpretation tend to lean into the proposition that the Marquise was

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  27 conscious to the point of consent throughout the Count’s assault (thus taking the epigram cited above seriously), the story is far more effective if we grant that Kleist’s apparent refusal to resolve the polyvalence essentially catalyzes the overall diegetic structure.7 For the central core of the narrative, the Count is largely out of the picture. As the pregnancy progresses, and the Marquise becomes more and more dumbfounded by the seemingly inexplicable symptoms that have befallen her and that seem so familiar to her from her two previous pregnancies, she summons a doctor for his opinion and an examination. She receives the doctor’s confirmation that she is surely pregnant as a shameless affront to her integrity, but when he goes to take his leave she stops him to ask how this could be possible. His response—really a clumsy gesture of avoidance, for he is after all speaking with a noblewoman—is “daß er ihr die letzten Gründe der Dinge nicht werde erklären brauchen” (II, 120; “that she would presumably not expect him to explain the facts of life to her [Luke and Reeves 86]). The doctor bows and leaves without further discussion. Kleist’s description of the Marquise’s reaction is notable as it ties the trauma of memory loss at this point not to violence but to another prominent Kleistian theme: paralysis at the moment of vehement, extreme resistance. Precisely as the Marquise—like many other figures in Kleist’s plays and stories—undertakes to exert her will powerfully, she is rendered passive. Whether by an inner or an external force is often uncertain: Die Marquise stand, wie vom Donner gerührt. Sie raffte sich auf, und wollte zu ihrem Vater eilen; doch der sonderbare Ernst des Mannes [= the doctor], von dem sie sich beleidigt sah, lähmte alle ihre Glieder. Sie warf sich in der größten Bewegung auf den Diwan nieder. Sie durchlief, gegen sich selbst mißtrauisch, alle Momente des verflossenen Jahres, und hielt sich für verrückt, wenn sie an den letzten dachte. (II, 120–21) The Marquise stood as if thunderstruck. Recovering from herself, she was on the point of going straight to her father; but the strangely serious manner of this man by whom she felt so insulted numbed her in every limb. She threw herself down on the divan in the greatest agitation. Mistrustful of herself, she cast her mind back over every moment of the past year, and when she thought of those through which she had just passed it seemed to her that she must be going crazy. (Luke and Reeves 87) For the Marquise, the source of the paralysis is both internal and external: internal because of the undeniable stirrings in her womb, external because the doctor insists on what is for the Marquise the worst possible

28  Steven R. Huff explanation. The disparity is overwhelming; her innate sense of self (all based on memory) is simultaneously undermined by her physical self and by the world around her. At this moment of maximal self-scrutiny she scans her memory with utmost mistrust but to no avail. The Marquise and those around her—family, servants, the midwife— are left to their own devices and inclinations to determine whether she is a pious widow, a transgressor (the only evidence of this is the irrefutable fact of her pregnancy), or a modern Madonna. The Marquise herself opts for the latter as the narrator, reliable or not, assures us of her guiltless conscience (“schuldfreies Bewußtsein”) and her strong disposition: “Ihr Verstand, stark genug, in ihrer sonderbaren Lage nicht zu reißen, gab sich ganz unter der großen, heiligen und unerklärlichen Einrichtung der Welt gefangen” (II, 126; “Her reason was strong enough to withstand her strange situation without giving way, and she submitted herself wholly to the great, sacred and inexplicable order of the world” [Luke and Reeves 93]). Like the Marquise’s attempt at recovering her memory and negotiating the evidence of her forgetting or of never having known, the narrative structure of Kleist’s story is not linear. It mirrors the multiple and conflicting planes of consciousness, her struggle resolves the convoluted fragments of her memory and therefore also of her self-identity. Indeed, the opening passage of the story begins toward the end of the narrated timeline as the Marquise, having accepted the reality of her pregnancy, decides to place an announcement in the newspaper. She writes: daß sie, ohne ihr Wissen, in andre Umstände gekommen sei, daß der Vater zu dem Kinde, das sie gebären würde, sich melden solle; und daß sie, aus Familienrücksichten, entschlossen wäre, ihn zu heiraten. (II, 104) that she had, without knowledge of the cause, come to find herself in a certain situation; that she would like the father of the child she was expecting to disclose his identity to her; and that she was resolved, out of consideration for her family, to marry him.8 (Luke and Reeves 68) This strikes us as a bold and bizarre act. It is part audacity, part desperation on the part of the Marquise, and artistically near ridiculous on the part of Kleist. It becomes only somewhat more plausible as the narrator lays out the events leading up to the announcement. The story ends by means of what we might call a reversal of forgetting or even a “re-membering.” Count F… presents himself to the Marquise and her family as the father of the as yet unborn child; rather than being relieved, the Marquise is traumatized by the fact that her quondam and ostensibly decent rescuer turns out to have raped her but now has again

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  29 become her rescuer in assuming full responsibility for the welfare of the Marquise and their child. The Marquise, after much agonizing, agrees—for the sake of the child—to marry the Russian Count. Time passes, memory and lapses are processed (we are not told how), and the narrator reports: “Eine ganze Reihe von jungen Russen folgte jetzt noch dem ersten” (II, 143; “A whole series of young Russians now followed the first” [Luke and Reeves 113]). The Count and the Marquise thus multiply and replenish— re-member—their little world. While various motivic and thematic sources have been proposed for Kleist’s story, the happy resolution is not present in the potential sources.9 The twist at the end is purely Kleistian—a game. Kleist’s fascination with the topic of “unknowing conception” did not begin with Die Marquise von O…. The theme is a focal point in his drama Amphitryon as well. The genesis of his play reaches back to 1803 (first published in 1807). In the subtitle, Kleist designates the drama a Lustspiel, a fitting genre classification for another one of Kleist’s literary memory games, and he indicates that it is based on Molière’s comedy (1668) of the same name. The first treatment of the ancient Amphitryon myth can be traced to a now lost tragedy by Sophocles, which presumably inspired Plautus’ reworking of the material as a burlesque. Audiences relished the play through the Middle Ages; it became especially popular during the Renaissance, and schoolboys enjoyed it nearly to the present wherever Latin was still taught. Other dramatists had also been attracted to the material. There are three versions in Spanish, two in Italian, and one by Camões from the sixteenth century. Nevertheless, we may take Kleist’s word that his primary source seems to have been Molière’s comedy, though Jean Rotrou’s French translation, Les Sosies (1636), the immediate antecedent to Molière’s play, and Johann Daniel Falk’s contemporary versions may have also inspired him. As a kind of underclass prequel to the main action, Amphitryon opens with the titular hero’s servant, Sosias, returning after battle to Thebes with orders to announce the impending homecoming of his victorious master, Amphitryon. He arrives at midnight just in time to see a suspicious figure—Mercury—who has taken the form of, and claims to be, Sosias himself. This being ostensibly a comedy, and given the subject matter, the jokes are predictably ontological. As Sosias attempts to enter the palace, Mercury blocks his way: MERKUR:  Halt dort! Wer geht dort? SOSIAS: Ich. MERKUR: Was für ein Ich? SOSIAS:  Meins mit Verlaub. Und meines, denk ich, geht

Hier unverzollt gleich andern. Mut Sosias! (148–50) MERCURY:  Halt! SOSIAS: Me.

Who goes there?

30  Steven R. Huff MERCURY:  What me, man? SOSIAS:  Me myself, sir, if you

please, Who’s got as much right as another to walk this road toll free. Courage, Sosias!

In the course of a few lines this bewildering exchange develops into a violent altercation, with Mercury pummeling Sosias and threatening him with the sword as he tries to convince him that he, Sosias, is no longer Sosias. MERKUR:  Bist SOSIAS:

du Sosias noch?

Ach laß mich gehn. Dein Stock kann machen, daß ich nicht mehr bin; Doch nicht, daß ich nicht Ich bin, weil ich bin. Der einzige Unterschied ist, daß ich mich Sosias jetzo der geschlagne, fühle. MERKUR:  Hund, sieh, so mach ich kalt dich. Er droht.… MERKUR:  Bist du Sosias noch, Verräter? SOSIAS: Ach!

Ich bin jetzt, was du willst. Befiehl, was ich Soll sein, dein Stock macht dich zum Herrn meines Lebens. MERKUR:  Du sprachst, du hättest dich Sosias sonst genannt? SOSIAS:  Wahr ists, daß ich bis diesen Augenblick gewähnt, Die Sache hätte ihre Richtigkeit. Doch das Gewicht hat deiner Gründe mich Belehrt: ich sehe jetzt, daß ich mich irrte. (228–45) MERCURY:  Are you still Sosias? SOSIAS:  Let me go, I beg you. Your

stick can make it so that I’m no more, but not that I’m not I, because I am. The only difference is that now I feel I’m Sosias-Who’sBeen-Beaten. MERCURY: (raising his stick) Careful, cur, or I will stretch you out.… MERCURY:  Are

you Still Sosias, then, you sneaking spy? SOSIAS: Alas for me, now I am what you please. Order me to be whoever, and I am, your stick makes you the master of my life.

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  31 Confronted with his apparently now third-person self, and facing the expediency of violence, Sosias renounces his self. Kleist is able effectively to spin out this kind of dialogue for an additional 150 lines until Merkur is certain that the existential damage has been done and Sosias has been scared off. In Act I, 4 the still nocturnal setting has shifted to the inner chambers of the palace. Here also the mood turns quickly from the slapstick and farce of the subalterns to the potentially lethal duress that Jupiter, in the guise of Amphitryon, wreaks upon Alkmene. She is given to understand that Amphitryon has secretly returned to her ahead of his army for a night of marital bliss. Now, however, he must hurry back to the troops, before dawn breaks, in order to lead the triumphal march home. She expresses her aching desire not to let the man she mistakenly takes for her husband out of her arms; and this is not least because she is flattered by the diadem that Jupiter/Amphitryon has allegedly brought her as a trophy gift from the battle: ALKMENE:  Amphitryon!

So willst du gehn? Ach, wie So lästig ist so vieler Ruhm, Geliebter! Wie gern gäb ich das Diadem, das du Erkämpft, für einen Strauß von Veilchen hin, Um eine niedre Hütte eingesammelt. Was brauchen wir, als nur uns selbst? (423–28) ALCMENE:  Amphitryon!

You must be going, dear? Oh, what a burden so much fame is, love! How gladly I’d give up the diadem you won for me, for a bunch of violets picked outside a cottage door. What do we need, we two, except ourselves? Unwittingly, these genuinely heartfelt sentiments have an unintended affect on Jupiter just as he is trying to extricate himself from Alkmene before the real Amphitryon returns home: Jupiter is filled with jealousy. The divine interloper envies the human husband: JUPITER:  Geliebte!

Wie du mich entzückst! Doch eine Besorgnis auch erregst du mir, die ich So scherzhaft sie auch klingt, dir nennen muß.… So öffne mir dein Innres den, und sprich, Ob den Gemahl du heut, dem du verlobt bist, Ob den Geliebten du empfangen hast?…

32  Steven R. Huff Entwöhne, Geliebte, von dem Gatten dich, Und unterscheide zwischen mir und ihm. (445–69) JUPITER:  My

love, The fascination that you have for me! But I confess that you inspire me with a misgiving I must voice, as whimsical as it may sound to you.… So open your heart to me and tell: was it your lawful husband, or your lover, whom you received into your arms this night?… From the husband wean yourself away, love, and learn how to distinguish me from him. Jupiter is obviously aware of how egregious the favor he solicits from Alkmene must sound. At least that seems to be the point of the missing metrical foot (the choke) in I, 468. Unlike the parallel universe we saw in the dialogue between Sosias and Merkur, there is no humor in Alkmene’s palace, where the Olympian deity has deigned to consort with a mere mortal. It is heinous manipulation of a woman who is wholly without guile. For the mortal characters in Amphitryon, memory is identity, and even with the genre demands of comedy, Kleist has them desperately clinging to whatever remains of their individual existential vestiges. When the real Amphitryon returns at dawn from battle, he finds that Sosias has failed to carry out the command to prepare Alkmene and the court for the king’s homecoming. The latter insists on an explanation, to which Sosias replies multiple times that he was prevented by his own self (i.e., by Merkur in the guise of Sosias). Amphitryon, infuriated and confused, presses him to clarify the seeming nonsense: “Und wer hat dich, Verräter, deine Pflicht/ Verfehlen lassen? Hund, Nichtswürdiger!” (740–41; “Who, you traitor, stopped you in your duty? Villain! Good-for-nothing wretch!”). To which Sosias replies in one last desperate effort: Muß ich es zehn und zehnmal wiederholen? Ich, hab ich Euch gesagt, dies Teufels-Ich, Das sich der Türe dort bemächtigt hatte; Das Ich, das das alleinge Ich will sein; Das Ich vom Hause dort, das Ich vom Stocke, Das Ich, das mich halb tot geprügelt hat. (740–47)

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  33 How often do I have to say it? For the tenth time: it was me, that demon-me who took possession of the gate, the me who wants to be the one and only me, who came out of the palace there, who beat me half to death. What Kleist presents us with here is neither the prototypical Romantic Doppelgänger nor some kind of a split personality, even if the resulting damage to Sosias’ identity is similar in effect. Sosias is neither deranged nor mentally or organically ill but rather existentially unmoored. On which iteration of himself may he now rely? As with the Marquise von O…, Sosias can no longer trust what was once the fundamental fact, a memory, of his own identity, and the consequences, as both the novella and the drama depict, are acutely threatening. Memory in Kleist is often inextricably linked to brutality. As in Die Marquise von O…, so also in Amphitryon, where it is no less muted and just as graphic. Sosias, of course, is merely the standard comedic subaltern. He is essentially a Hanswurst figure, so one expects a degree of raucousness. Kleist, however, will tighten the screws all the more forcefully in Act II when he shifts his attention to the principals, the royal husband and wife. At this point it’s worth observing how Kleist’s and the Romantics’ intuitive approach to the psychology of memory, 200 years ahead of today’s clinical memory studies, foreshadows in its impressive amplitude and sheer array of modalities twenty-first century scientific views. One scholar and clinician, for instance, has written that memory erasure may possibly lead to a lacuna, a gap in one’s affective memory fabric. As such, there can be a loss of contextual orientation usually provided by one’s associated emotions and procedural memories. Erasure provides limited possibility for creating new responses and coherent narratives, the weaving of which provides cohesion of different elements of an individual’s identity and sense of agency. What remains from erasure is the likely existence of unknown triggers to unconscious procedural memories, which stay intransigently lodged in the … body psyche, causing ongoing distress and mercurial symptoms.10 (Levine 147) This lacuna or illogical disjunction, which, as we have seen, affects the Marquise’s “memory fabric” after the rape, has its parallel in the equally non-consensual atrocity forced upon Alkmene (and to a lesser extent on Amphitryon) by Jupiter. The after-effects of the trauma suffered by the Marquise and Alkmene are thus not merely similar but also predictable in terms of twentieth-century memory theory. It may be stretching things a bit to point out that the shape-changer Mercury, the Roman god of

34  Steven R. Huff (among other things) trickery, is the figure who, as a result of his brutalization of Sosias, causes the latter’s “ongoing distress and mercurial [that is to say, destabilizing] symptoms.” Mercury also facilitates Amphitryon’s bewilderment and, more devastatingly, assists Jupiter in catalyzing Alkmene’s ontologically jarring, disparate, discrepant, and divergent planes of memory. Although Alkmene was perplexed and deeply troubled in Act I when Jupiter (in the guise of Amphitryon) had asked her to compare her husband to her lover, the full sense of crisis for Alkmene and Amphitryon becomes apparent only when, in Act II, Amphitryon returns from battle and the two must process how it can be that Alkmene is absolutely certain that Amphitryon had been with her during the night, whereas her husband knows that he was not: ALKMENE:  Hat

dir ein böser Dämon das Gedächtnis Geraubt, Amphitryon? hat dir vielleicht Ein Gott den heitern Sinn verwirrt, daß du Die keusche Liebe deiner Gattin, höhnend, Von allem Sittlichen entkleiden willst? AMPHITRYON:  Was? Mir wagst du zu sagen, daß ich gestern Hier um die Dämmerung eingeschlichen bin? Daß ich dir scherzend auf den Nacken–Teufel! ALKMENE:  Was? Mir wagst du zu leugnen, daß du gestern Hier um die Dämmrung eingeschlichen bist? Daß du dir jede Freiheit hast erlaubt, Die dem Gemahl mag zustehn über mich? (839–50) ALCMENE:  Has

an evil spirit robbed you of all recollection, is that it, Amphitryon? Or has a god perhaps been able to undermine the happy disposition of your mind so that you wish, insultingly, to strip your wife’s chaste love of all its purity? AMPHITRYON:  You dare to stand there telling me I slipped into your room at nightfall yesterday? That playfully, on your neck, I pressed—the devil, oh! ALCMENE:  You dare to stand there and deny you slipped in here at nightfall yesterday? Took every liberty with me a husband is permitted? For a brief space it seems that the couple may be able to clarify the confusion by means of Alkmene’s willingly delivered, detailed narration of the

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  35 events of the night before; and Amphitryon—at least at first—listens patiently and hopefully. Perhaps it was only a dream. But reality, such as it is, resists such a conclusion. Alkmene and Amphitryon can conceive only of total amnesia as an escape: “Schweig, ich will nichts wissen,” (1004, 1006; “Silence, I don’t want to know anything”), they both say separately. The Marquise, interestingly, in the midst of her own trauma, utters the same words of hopeless incomprehension and surrender (II, 129). Kleist is at times impressively consistent and systematic as he endeavors to explicate the human condition. Memory and amnesia are irredeemably intertwined, he seems to be arguing here and elsewhere in his writing. The extreme fragility of the “memory fragment” becomes unmitigable when Alkmene produces the diadem that Jupiter (as Amphitryon) gave her as a gift in exchange for a nocturnal kiss and so much more. When she displays it as concrete proof of her marital fidelity, however, she notices that the letter “J” is inscribed on it. Faced with the obvious consequences and overcome with the utmost feeling of self-alienation, Alkmene nevertheless resists ultimate surrender in perhaps the drama’s most beautiful passage: Eh will ich irren in mir selbst! Eh will ich dieses innerste Gefühl, Das ich am Mutterbusen eingesogen, Und das mir sagt, daß ich Alkmene bin, Für einen Parther oder Perser halten. Ist diese Hand mein? Diese Brust hier mein? Gehört das Bild mir, das der Spiegel strahlt? Er wäre fremder mir, als ich! Nimm mir Das Aug, so hör ich ihn; das Ohr, ich fühl ihn; Mir das Gefühl hinweg, ich atm’ ihn noch; Nimm Aug und Ohr, Gefühl mir und Geruch, Mir alle Sinn und gönne mir das Herz: So läßt du mir die Glocke, die ich brauche, Aus seiner Welt noch find ich ihn heraus. (1154–67) As soon mistake myself, I would! As soon imagine I’m a Persian or a Parthian, in spite of that profoundest feeling, sucked in with my mother’s milk, which tells me I am I, Alcmene. Look, this hand, does it belong to me? This bosom? My reflection in the mirror? He would have had to be stranger to me than my own self! Put out my eye, still I would hear him; stop my ear and I would feel him; take touch away

36  Steven R. Huff I’d breathe his presence in; take all my senses, every one, but only leave my heart, that bell—its note is all I need to find him out, wherever, in the world. Still, the concrete trigger, the physical, undeniable presence of the diadem, threatens her sense of identity to the utmost and menaces as well the joint identity of the faithful couple. Conflicting planes of consciousness portend tragedy. The stupendous fifth scene of Act II, which is entirely Kleist’s invention, sets forth this dizzying linguistic obliteration of the self. Jupiter, again as Amphitryon, appears to Alkmene. Confusion reigns, and pronouns, loosed from their deictic underpinnings, become useless in any attempt to reestablish a reliable iteration of self or mnemonic stability: ALKMENE:  O

mein Gemahl! Kannst du mir gütig sagen, Warst dus, warst du es nicht? O sprich! du warsts! JUPITER:  Ich wars. Seis wer es wolle. Sei–sei ruhig, Was du gesehn, gefühlt, gedacht, empfunden, War ich: wer wäre außer mir, Geliebte? Wer deine Schwelle auch betreten hat, Mich immer hast du, Teuerste, empfangen, Und für jedwede Gunst, die du ihm schenktest, Bin ich dein Schuldner, und ich danke dir. (1263–72) ALCMENE:  Oh

my dear husband, please do tell me, was it you or not? Speak, it was you, it was! JUPITER:  Yes it was me. But it’s no matter who it was. I beg you: make an effort to be calm, for everything you saw, you thought, you touched, you felt was me—and who else should it be? Whatever man it was that stepped across your threshold, it was me whom you received, and for every single favor you allowed him I’m the one who’s in your debt, for which I thank you heartily. Jupiter’s sophistry is out of place at this juncture and is wholly insufficient to reassure Alkmene. At stake here is her chasteness, in the narrowest sense, and her virtuousness, her unquestioned loyalty to Amphitryon, in the broadest sense. But Amphitryon/Jupiter’s expression of magnanimity, “Seis wer es wolle” (“whoever it was”) has the opposite effect than what he intended. For Alkmene, the precise “wer” (“who”) does matter. The imprecision is unbearable since it allows the possibility that she has been unfaithful to her

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  37 husband: “Nein, mein Amphitryon, hier irrst du dich, / Jetzt lebe wohl auf ewig, du Geliebter. / Auf diesen Fall war ich gefaßt” (1273–75; “No, my Amphitryon, here you are wrong. Now I must say goodbye to you forever, my beloved. Oh, I steeled myself against this possibility”). The mutability of memory (and therefore of identity) is asserted once again in the final act as Jupiter/Amphitryon and the mortal Amphitryon, and Mercury/Sosias and the mortal Sosias, confront each other (or, following the three-act-long conceit, their putative selves). Most brutally, Alkmene is expected in front of all the bystanders to respond to Jupiter’s and Amphitryon’s insistence that she identifies the genuine Amphitryon. For neither the first nor the last time in Kleist’s dramas, the overwrought and now fully traumatized characters—first Amphitryon, then Alkmene— lapse temporarily into unconsciousness. Jupiter, the deus in excelsis who has instigated the entire mess and served as Kleist’s chief instrument in this literary game of torture, undertakes a generic literary deus ex machina, revealing himself, amidst clouds, thunder, and lightning, and holding the requisite thunderbolt, in his true form. Having overcome his stupor, Amphitryon asks as a favor of Jupiter that he be granted a son. Jupiter accedes, proclaiming that the demigod shall be called Hercules; and here Alkmene “discovers her fate of bearing a son to two fathers,” which underscores powerfully “what the play represents as a deep and painful ambiguity” (Krier 42). Kleist gives Alkmene the last word. In fact, it is the final syllable of the drama: “Ach!” Alkmene is left to wrestle with the conflicting planes of consciousness, and the reader can only ponder the monosyllable’s virtually unlimited polyvalence. It is yet another game. Until now it has been possible to examine Kleist’s use of memory while for the most part skirting such Freudian terms as displacement and repression. With Kleist’s masterpiece Penthesilea completed in 1807 and first published in 1808, this is no longer possible. The five-act tragedy tells Kleist’s version of the story of the legendary Amazon queen, who takes her army of warriors into battle against the Greeks. The impetus for the battle is the socio-religious structure of the Amazon state: It is a nation comprised only of women; perpetuation of the state requires that the women warriors glean their mates through battle. They are strictly enjoined, however, from choosing a particular warrior from the male adversaries. Instead, they must engage the enemy with bow and arrow, spears, axes, chariots, and attack dogs. The foes who are not killed but taken randomly as prisoners of the Amazons are celebrated as tokens of triumph in the Rosenfest, after which the prisoners are “allowed” to sire the next generation of Amazons before being freed to return to their homeland. Nine months later the male offspring are put to death, whereas the females are incorporated into Amazon society and raised as future soldiers. According to legend, the young girls would have their right breast removed and cauterized in order to enable them to become more effective archers. Kleist thematizes this ritual act of mutilation to good effect in his play.

38  Steven R. Huff The roots of the Amazon mutilation ritual lie in the remote past. As such, they are a form of institutional memory–memorialization.11 Penthesilea explains to Achilles, after she has captured him, that the Amazons are descendants of the ancient Scythians, who were conquered by the Ethopian King Vexoris. The Ethiopian army slaughtered all the male Scythians, but the Scythian women rebelled. Their queen, Tanaïs, murdered Vexoris, and the Scythian women slaughtered the rest of the Ethiopians during the course of a single night, having surreptitiously armed themselves with daggers forged from their ornaments and fine jewelry. Tanaïs was then proclaimed queen of the new nation of women, and she immediately established laws: the heroic women shall no longer be subjects of male rule; men will henceforth be excluded from the Amazon state: Der Mann, des Auge diesen Staat erschaut, Der soll das Auge gleich auf ewig schließen; Und wo ein Knabe geboren wird, Von der Tyrannen Kuß, da folg er gleich Zum Orkus noch den wilden Vätern nach. (1964–68) The man who once claps eyes on our land of women, he claps them shut forever. If it happens that a boy should be the issue of the tyrants’ hug, down to Orcus instantly he goes, right after his own savage father. Then just as Tanaïs ascends the altar to take up the golden bow of the former Scythian king, doubt is expressed among her followers as to whether women would be able to defend themselves with such a weapon. Tanaïs pauses solemnly, then tears off her own right breast and pronounces the new race “the Amazons” (the breastless, according to folk etymology). A golden crown is then placed upon her head. Penthesilea is the descendant of this first queen; to her falls the sacred duty to uphold the laws. These include the code of war (as mentioned above) by which Amazon archers may only take their mates in battle, and there only inadvertently and temporarily. Institutional memory plays a role in other works by Kleist, most notably perhaps in Robert Guiskard and Die Herrmannsschlacht, and to a lesser extent in Prinz Friedrich von Homburg. Among the novellas, one might also include to varying degrees Michael Kohlhaas, Das Erdbeben in Chili, and Die heilige Cäcilie. In each of these instances, history, ritual, and violence are interconnected. In Penthesilea, however, memorialization merely furnishes the backdrop for a stellar example of the kind of psychological and existential manifestations of memory trauma we have seen in Die Marquise von O… and Amphitryon. In the foreground is an instance of radical psychopathological repression that occurs in the play’s final scene and that ends in the self-destruction of the eponymous heroine.

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  39 Like the ancient Greek epics, Kleist’s Penthesilea is structured in 24 scenes. This lends gravitas to his undertaking and also creates a dramatic development through which the action intensifies in relatively short increments, from one scene to the next, until it culminates in the catastrophic denouement of the final two scenes. The accumulated tension that explodes (and implodes) here is created by the clash between Amazon law (which prohibits Penthesilea from falling in love) and the desires of her heart, between culture and nature: in clear violation of the Amazon code of war, Penthesilea has fallen in love with Achilles, the Greek enemy, and has chosen him specifically in a confused blend of battle and courtship. Achilles, as one might have predicted, has also fallen in love with her. After she explains to him the strategies and complications of Amazon rules of combat, he pretends to fight her, with the understanding that she will not kill him, but take him prisoner, which will facilitate their courtship, ostensibly without breaking Amazon rules. But heart and conscience do not permit her to love and fight concurrently. As Achilles observed, when he learned from Penthesilea the brutal origins of the state (slaying the entire Ethiopian army, infanticide, Tanaïs’ self-mutilation): “Vernichtend war das Schicksal, Königin, / Das deinem Frauenstaat das Leben gab” (1932–33; “Destruction was the fate, Queen, that gave birth to your women’s state”). Penthesilea’s torturous predicament is accompanied by fainting spells, hallucinations, and manic mood swings as she attempts to repress and displace one or the other of the two forces that—in fierce competition—threaten her existence. In Scene 23, partly because of a misunderstanding between Penthesilea and Achilles, and partly because of her unbearable inner turmoil, Penthesilea slips into a frenzy and, dropping the planned pretense, begins to attack Achilles ruthlessly. In a fine example of dramatic teichoscopy, the princess Meroe reports the horrifying action in the third person to the high priestess in all its graphic detail: accompanied by elephants and attack dogs, Penthesilea pursues Achilles until she is close enough to span her bow (she bends the bow back so the two ends kiss [2647]). The impossibly taut bow thus becomes a metaphor both for Penthesilea’s inner conflict and for the extreme intensity induced by Meroe’s teichoscopic narrative. Penthesilea launches an arrow into Achilles’ neck. Achilles, wheezing but still barely alive, attempts to flee, stumbles and falls again. She then sets her attack dogs on him, calling each by name. Achilles, as Meroe describes, manages barely to articulate a few final words: Er, in dem Purpur seines Bluts sich wälzend, Rührt ihre [= Penthesilea’s] sanfte Wange an, und ruft: “Penthesilea! Meine Braut! was tust du? Ist dies das Rosenfest, das du versprachst?” (2662–65)

40  Steven R. Huff He, weltering in the purple of his blood, touches her soft cheeks and cries, “Whatever are you doing, Penthesilea, my bride? Is this the Feast of Roses you promised?” Here Kleist ratchets up the description considerably and even more shockingly, both for the Amazons and the reader/audience, when he has Penthesilea kneel down to compete with the hounds in the carnage. Sie schlägt, die Rüstung ihm vom Leibe reißend, Den Zahn schlägt sie in seine weiße Brust, Sie und die Hunde, die wetteifernden[.] (2669–71) She rips away his armor from his body, and sinks her teeth into his white breast, dogs and woman struggling to outdo each other. Kleist cannot resist adding the gruesome and graphic detail that Achilles’ blood is dripping from Penthesilea’s mouth and hands (2674). To the acts of violence that define Amazon history, we can now add cannibalism, the ultimate taboo. The high priestess and the warrior princesses are dumfounded and Penthesilea, also speechless, seems to have lapsed into a trance. Two Amazons bring her a basin of water; she pours water over her head, then again, and then again. This act, we suspect, is not a sort of baptism into new life but rather a preparation for death, a kind of Amazon extreme unction. Penthesilea seems now to have been transported into a state of ecstasy. Then she sees Achille’s bloody body and asks repeatedly who has done this to him. Eventually the high priestess explains what has happened. Penthesilea’s speech now becomes fragmented, inchoate, and aposiopetic, a sign that she is attempting to cope with the unthinkable. Then she speaks, “I tore him up. Or was it something else? Did I kiss him dead?” (2971–73). Enter Freud (finally): So war es ein Versehen. Küsse, Bisse, Das reimt sich, und wer recht von Herzen liebt, Kann schon das eine für das andre greifen. (2981–83) So it was an error. Kisses, bites, the same thing, and when you love straight from the heart the greedy mouth so easily mistakes one for the other. The German words for “kisses” and “bites” rhyme (almost). Penthesilea resists the efforts of the Amazons to pull her from Achilles and kneels

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  41 down before him. In words directed now to the dismembered corpse she says: Du Ärmster aller Menschen, du vergibst mir! Ich habe mich, bei Diana, bloß versprochen, Weil ich der raschen Lippe Herr nicht bin; Doch jetzt sag ich dir deutlich, wie ichs meinte: Dies, Geliebter, wars, und weiter nichts. (2985–89) Unhappiest of men, forgive me, please! It was a slip— I swear it, by Diana—of the tongue, no more, because I failed to guard my rash lip; but now I’ll tell you clearly how I meant it: It was this, beloved, and nothing more. She kisses him, and then elaborates: Wie manche, die am Hals des Freundes hängt, Sagt wohl das Wort: sie liebt ihn, o so sehr, Daß sie vor Liebe gleich ihn essen könnte; Und hinterher das Wort prüft, die Närrin! Gesättigt sein zum Ekel ist sie schon. Nun, du Geliebter, so verfuhr ich nicht. Sieh hier: als ich an deinem Hals hing, Hab ichs wahrhaftig Wort für Wort getan; Ich war nicht so verrückt, als es wohl schien. (2991–99) Think how often it’s the case, with her arms wound around her neck her darling’s neck, a woman says she loves him, oh, so much much that she could eat him. But then when it comes down to it, the poor fool finds she’s had a bellyful of him already. Well, my darling, that was not my way. You see: when I wound my arms around your neck I did exactly that, word for word. I wasn’t so insane as it seemed. These three adjacent passages, spoken over Achilles’ dead body, are classic instances of what Freud would later call Fehlleistungen (lapses), or as they are commonly known in English, “Freudian slips.” James Strachey, Freud’s first English translator, coined the term “parapraxes,” which has become the clinical term for the two categories of Fehlleistungen: actions and speech. Along with dreams, parapraxes constitute the major mechanisms of

42  Steven R. Huff displacement (Verschiebung). As a form of repression, they provide a means to “transform morally reprehensible wishes into something more acceptable” (de Berg 19).12 Nearly a century before Freud published his Psychologie des Alltagslebens (1904), in which he developed in depth his theory of Fehlleistungen or parapraxes, Kleist provided, in Penthesilea, the portrait of a personality attempting desperately (and unconsciously) to transform her horrific deeds and desires into the morally and socially acceptable. Penthesilea begins by calling her action a simple mistake, a Versehen—a term that Freud in fact uses as a synonym for Fehlleistung.13 A verbal slip— Küsse instead of Bisse—describes the displacement from violence to love. Penthesilea says she simply confused the two: “When you love straight from the heart the greedy mouth so easily mistakes one for the other.” The double-entendres in Penthesilea’s monologue (or, more accurately, her dialogue with the dead Achilles) are plentiful. She says she has simply misspoken—“Ich habe mich, bei Diana, bloß versprochen” (2986)—and, outrageously on the part of Kleist, she says she did this because she is unable to control her rash lip, a displacement referring to her cannibalism. This kind of extreme effort is ultimately unsuccessful. By means of the same metaphors, she eventually must confront the unbearable. Using an analogy still common today, she compares herself to a girl who says she loves someone so much she could eat him (2991–93). But at this turn, she reverses the direction of the displacement, thus collapsing it, and literalizes the metaphor: she explains, to herself (and to Achilles), that she enacted the lover’s metaphor word for word (“Wort für Wort”) in reality (“wahrhaftig”). And: “I wasn’t so insane as it seemed” (2999). Word for word: the curtain could have easily dropped here. But Kleist develops this act of literalizing a metaphor one radical step further. Penthesilea tells her shocked entourage, “Ich sage vom Gesetz der Fraun mich los, / Und folge diesem Jüngling hier” (3012–13; “I abjure the law of our women, I will follow the man lying here”).14 The Amazons recognize the ominous implication, and the warrior princess Prothoe tries to take Penethesilea’s dagger from her. Penthesilea doesn’t resist, and even willingly hands over her bow and quiver. Then she declaims her final monologue: Denn jetzt steig ich in meinem Busen nieder, Gleich einem Schacht, und grabe, kalt wie Erz, Mir ein vernichtendes Gefühl hervor. Dies Erz, dies läutr’ ich in der Glut des Jammers Hart mir zu Stahl; tränk es mit Gift sodann, Heißätzendem, der Reue, durch und durch; Trag es der Hoffnung ewgem Amboß zu, Und schärf und spitz es mir zu einem Dolch; Und diesem Dolch jetzt ich meine Brust: So! So! So! So! Und wieder! – Nun ists gut. (3025–34)

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  43 For now I will descend into myself, as if into a mine, to dig a feeling out as cold as iron ore. This ore, I will refine it in the fire of misery into hard steel; then steep it in the hot corrosive poison of remorse, through and through; to hope’s eternal anvil next I’ll carry it, to hone and point it dagger sharp; and to this dagger now I offer up my breast: like so! and so! and so! And once again—and now all’s well. And she falls and dies. Literary form and dramatic action, metaphor and reality, are hyperbolically combined here in a way that perfectly depicts the rift, the irreconcilable planes of memory, informing and deforming Penthesilea’s consciousness. Kleist employs the motif of descending deep into the mineshaft of the soul, a quintessential German Romantic motif, to represent Penthesilea’s demise.15 Her fatal implosion is in equal portions literal and metaphorical: Penthesilea literally kills herself metaphorically. It is an act of violence without violence, memorable for those left behind, but for Penthesilea, the ultimate forgetting. In the examples elaborated above, memory can be seen as a superb metaphor for Kleist’s finely nuanced notion of (un-)consciousness. As such, his understanding of Mnemosyne rests comfortably within the characteristic Romantic paradigms of memory. Where he often distances himself from his contemporaries is in his inclination to the violent, terrible, and soul-numbing—in short, the even more distant and darker—corners of the link between memory and the unconscious self. Yet for all they deviate in tenor and type from the writing of his contemporaries, Kleist’s memory games register clearly on the cultural seismograph of the Romantic exploration of the unconscious. While scholars have often puzzled over whether to locate Kleist within the Classic or the Romantic canon, his fascination with memory, at least, clearly aligns him with his Romantic contemporaries in their program of exploring and mapping the unconscious and in their proposition that the Schattenseite of human existence often belies the Enlightenment celebration of the rational.

Notes 1 References to Kleist’s writings are from Heinrich von Kleist, Sämtliche Werke, ed. Helmut Sembdner, 2 vols. (Munich: Hanser, 1984). Prose citations are given by volume and page number; excerpts from the dramas are indicated simply by line number. Translations into English of Kleist’s dramas are from: Heinrich von Kleist, Five Plays. Transl. and with an introduction by Martin Greenberg. The English translation of Die Marquise von O… is from: Heinrich von Kleist, The Marquise of O—and Other Stories. Transl. David

44  Steven R. Huff Luke and Nigel Reeves. Occasional deviations are for the sake of clarity. Translations of all other quotations are my own. 2 On Kleist’s position within the literary canon with respect to periodization, see e.g., Ruth Angress (Klüger), “Kleists Abkehr von der Aufklärung”; Wolfgang Binder,“Ironischer Idealismus. Kleists unwillige Zeigenossenschaft”; Ulrich Gall, Philosophie bei Heinrich von Kleist. Untersuchungen zur Herkunft und Bestimmung des philosophischen Gehalts seiner Schriften; Linda Hoff-Purviance, “The Forms of Kleist’s Penthesilea and the Iliad”; Nigel Reeves, “Kleist’s Indebtedness to the Science, Psychiatry and Medicine of his Time”; and Wolfgang Wittkowski, “Hölderlin, Kleist und die deutsche Klassik.” On Kleist’s so-called “Kant crisis,” see the letter to his fiancée Wilhelmine von Zenge dated 22 March 1801 (II, 630–36) and the letter to his sister Ulrike von Kleist, 23 March 1801 (II, 636–37). 3 The number of studies devoted to some form of this topic is legion. A few of the many noteworthy examples include: Peter Dettmering, Heinrich von Kleist: Zur Psychodynamik in seiner Dichtung; Bernd Fischer, Ironische Metaphysik: Die Erzählungen Heinrich von Kleists; Ilse Graham, Heinrich von Kleist. Word into Flesh: A Poet’s Quest for the Symbol; Grant Profant McAllister, Jr., Kleist’s Female Leading Characters and the Subversion of Idealist Discourse; Jochen Schmidt, Heinrich von Kleist: Studien zu seiner poetischen Verfahrensweise; Walter Müller-Seidel, Versehen und Erkennen: Eine Studie über Heinrich von Kleist; Ricarda Schmidt, Seán Allan, Steven Howe, Unverhoffte Wirkungen: Erziehung und Gewalt im Werk Heinrich von Kleists; Anthony Stephens, Heinrich von Kleist: The Dramas and Stories; Siegfried Streller, Das dramatische Werk Heinrich von Kleists; and Wolfgang Wittkowski, Kleist: Wert-Ethik, Wahrheit, Widerstand und Wieder-Auf-ErStehung [sic!]. 4 For studies on Kleist and somnambulism, mesmerism and the like—topics that are more than tangential to this essay—see my articles, “Heinrich von Kleist und Eberhard Gmelin: Neue Überlegungen”and “The Holunder-Motif in Kleist’s Das Käthchen von Heilbronn and Its Nineteenth-Century Context,” as well as my book, Heinrich von Kleist’s Poetics of Passivity; see also Nigel Reeves, “Kleist’s Indebtedness to the Science, Psychiatry and Medicine of His Time”; Maria Tatar, Spellbound: Studies on Mesmerism and Literature; Herminio Schmidt, Heinrich von Kleist. Naturwissenschaft als Dichtungsprinzip; and Katharine Weder, Kleists magnetische Poesie: Experimente des Mesmerismus. 5 See Cohn, “Kleist’s Marquise von O…: The Problem of Knowledge”; Huff, “Kleist and Expectant Virgins”; Heinz Politzer, “Der Fall der Marquise.” 6 This epigram appeared in the April/May 1808 number of the short-lived journal Phöbus. Ein Journal für die Kunst which was published by Kleist and Adam Müller. Interestingly, Goethe’s reaction to Penthesilea mirrored the distaste of others. In response to an excerpt that Kleist had sent him (also published in Phöbus), Goethe wrote to Kleist: “Mit der Penthesilea kann ich mich noch nicht befreunden. Sie ist aus einem so wunderbaren Geschlecht und bewegt sich in einer so fremden Region daß ich mir Zeit nehmen muß, mich in beide zu finden. Auch erlauben Sie mir zu sagen (denn wenn man nicht aufrichtig sein sollte, so wäre es besser man schwiege gar) daß es mich immer betrübt und bekümmert, wenn ich junge Männer von Geist und Talent sehe, die auf ein Theater warten, welches da kommen soll” (Helmut Sembdner, Heinrich von Kleists Lebensspuren, 179–80; “I cannot yet acquire a taste for Penthesilea. She is from such a marvelous lineage and moves in such strange lands that I need to take time to find my way into both. And permit me to say [since, if one were not sincere, it would be better to remain silent] that it

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  45 always saddens and grieves me when I see young men of high intellect and talent waiting for a [kind of] theater which is supposed to be coming” [my translation]). Goethe extended this same lament to others of Kleist’s generation and saw such tendencies as typical of and unfortunate for Romanticism. 7 A more nuanced approach to this question is offered by Laura Martin, “Loss of Memory, Estrangement from the Body: Heinrich von Kleist’s Die Marquise von O….” 8 This otherwise excellent translation is here imprecise. The phrase “in andre Umstände” is a common idiom for “pregnant.” 9 Alfred Klaar, Die Marquise von O…, proposed possible sources. These include Montaigne, Cervantes, an anonymous story titled Die gerettete Unschuld. For a discussion of other potential sources see also my article “Kleist and Expectant Virgins.” 10 On the concept of “procedural memory” see here 25–27. 11 On institutional memory and memorialization, see Part III of Paul Ricoeur’s massive Memory, History, Forgetting. Pp. 369–411 are especially relevant. 12 Freud began using the term Verdrängung (repression) in 1915 as an umbrella term for all these kinds of psychological defense mechanisms. See Peter Gay, Freud, 365–66. 13 Sigmund Freud, Zur Psychopathologie des Alltagslebens, 61–117. 14 The translation “man” does not adequately convey the sense of “Jüngling” here, which can mean something more like “teenager” or “young man.” 15 The most thorough study of this ubiquitous image can be found in chapter 2 of Theodore Ziolkowski’s magnificent German Romanticism and Its Institutions, 18–63. From the perspective of the history of science, see also Douwe Draaisma, Metaphors of Memory, 72–78.

Works Cited Angress (Klüger), Ruth. “Kleists Abkehr von der Aufklärung.” Kleist-Jahrbuch 1987: 98–114. de Berg, Henk. Freud’s Theory and Its Use in Literary and Cultural Studies. An Introduction. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2003. Binder, Wolfgang. “Ironischer Idealismus. Kleists unwillige Zeitgenossenschaft.” Aufschlüsse. Zürich: Artemis (1976): 311–26. Cohn, Dorrit. “Kleist’s Marquise von O…: The Problem of Knowledge.” Monatshefte 67 (1975): 129–44. Draaisma, Douwe. Metaphors of Memory. A History of Ideas about the Mind. Trans. Paul Vincent. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2000. Dettmering, Peter. Heinrich von Kleist: Zur Psychodynamik in seiner Dichtung. Eschborn: Fachbuchhandlung für Psychologie, 1986. Fischer, Bernd. Ironische Metaphysik: Die Erzählungen Heinrich von Kleists. Munich: Wilhelm Fink, 1988. Freud, Sigmund. Gesammelte Werke. Chronologisch geordnet. Vol. 4 (= Zur Psychologie des Alltagslebens). London: Imago (and Frankfurt am Main: Fischer), 1941. Gall, Ulrich. Philosophie bei Heinrich von Kleist. Untersuchungen zur Herkunft und Bestimmung des philosophischen Gehalts seiner Schriften. Bonn: Bouvier, 1977. Gay, Peter. Freud. A Life for Our Time. New York and London: W.W. Norton, 1988.

46  Steven R. Huff Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. Werke: Hamburger Ausgabe in 14 Bänden. Vol. 5, Dramatische Dichtungen. Textkritisch durchgesehen und mit Anmerkungen versehen von Josef Kunz. 6th ed. Hamburg: Christian Wegner Verlag, 1964. Graham, Ilse. Heinrich von Kleist. Word into Flesh: A Poet’s Quest for the Symbol. Berlin: Aufbau, 1977. Hoff-Purviance, Linda. “The Form of Kleist’s Penthesilea and the Iliad.” German Quarterly 55 (1982): 39–48. Huff, Steven R. “Heinrich von Kleist und Eberhard Gmelin: Neue Überlegungen.” Euphorion 86.2 (1992): 221–39. ———. Heinrich von Kleist’s Poetics of Passivity. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2009. ———. “The Holunder-Motif in Kleist’s Das Käthchen von Heilbronn and Its Nineteenth-Century Context.” German Quarterly 64 (1991): 304–12. ———. “Kleist and Expectant Virgins: The Meaning of the ‘O’ in Die Marquise von O….” Journal of English and Germanic Philology 81 (1982): 367–75. Klaar, Alfred, ed. Heinrich von Kleist: Die Marquise von O…. Berlin: PropyläenVerlag, 1922. Kleist, Heinrich von. The Marquise of O–: And Other Stories. Trans. with an intro. David Luke and Nigel Reeves. Harmonesworth, UK, et al.: Penguin, 1978. ———. Five Plays. Trans. Martin Greenberg. New Haven: Yale UP, 1988. ———. Sämtliche Werke. Ed. Helmut Sembdner. 2 vols. Munich: Hanser, 1984. Kleist, Heinrich von and Adam Müller, eds. Phöbus: Ein Journal für die Kunst. Afterword and commentary Helmut Sembdner. Stuttgart: J.G. Cotta’sche Buchhandlung Nachf., 1961. Krier, Theresa. “Amphitryon.” The Classical Tradition. Ed. A. Grafton, G. Most, and S. Settis. Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2010. 41–42. Levine, Peter A. Trauma and Memory. Brain and Body in a Search for the Living Past. Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 2015. Martin, Laura. “Loss of Memory, Estrangement from the Body: Heinrich von Kleist’s Die Marquise von O….” Memory, History and Critique: European Identity at the Millennium. Proceedings of the Fifth Conference of the International Society for the Study of European Ideas, 19–24 August 1996. Ed. S. Talmor and F. Brinkuis. Utrecht: ISSEI/U for Humanist Studies, 1996. 1–10. McAllister, Grant Profant, Jr. Kleist’s Female Leading Characters and the Subversion of Idealist Discourse. New York: Peter Lang, 2005. Müller-Seidel, Walter. Versehen und Erkennen: Eine Studie über Heinrich von Kleist. Cologne: Böhlau, 1971. Politzer, Heinz. “Der Fall der Frau Marquise. Beobachtungen zu Kleists Die Marquise von O….” Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift 51.1 (1977): 98–128. Reeves, Nigel. “Kleist’s Indebtedness to the Science, Psychiatry and Medicine of His Time.” Oxford German Studies 16 (1985): 47–65. Ricoeur, Paul. Memory, History, Forgetting. Trans. Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2004. Sembdner, Helmut, ed. Heinrich von Kleists Lebensspuren. Dokumente und Berichte der Zeitgenossen. Frankfurt/Main: Insel, 1984. Schmidt, Herminio. Heinrich von Kleist. Naturwissenschaft als Dichtungsprinzip. Bern: Haupt, 1978.

Amnesia, Chaos, Trauma  47 Schmidt, Jochen. Heinrich von Kleist: Studien zu seiner poetischen Verfahrensweise. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1974. Schmidt, Ricarda, Seán Allan, and Steven Howe. Unverhoffte Wirkungen: Erziehung und Gewalt im Werk Heinrich von Kleists. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2014. Stephens, Anthony. Heinrich von Kleist: The Dramas and Stories. Oxford: Berg, 1994. Streller, Siegfried. Das dramatische Werk Heinrich von Kleists. Berlin: Rütten & Loening, 1966. Tatar, Maria. Spellbound: Studies on Mesmerism and Literature. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1978. Weder, Katharine. Kleists magnetische Poesie: Experimente des Mesmerismus. Göttingen: Wallstein, 2008. Wittkowski, Wolfgang, “Hölderlin, Kleist und die deutsche Klassik.” Deutsche Literatur zur Zeit der Klassik. Ed. Karl Otto Conrady. Stuttgart: Reclam, 1977. 319–36. ———. Kleist: Wert-Ethik, Wahrheit, Widerstand und Wieder-Auf-Er-Stehung [sic!]. Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang, 2013. Ziolkowski, Theodore. German Romanticism and Its Institutions. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1990.

2 Hoffmann’s “Sandmann,” Henri Bergson, and the Matter of Memory Julian Knox

“Mutter zürnt wohl, und Clara mag glauben, ich lebe hier in Saus und Braus und vergesse mein holdes Engelsbild, so tief mir in Herz und Sinn eingeprägt, ganz und gar” (DKV 3, 11; “Mother is surely angry, and Clara would like to believe that I am living it up and have entirely forgotten her angelic image that is so deeply imprinted on my heart and mind”). “Er war anders gekleidet, aber Coppelius’ Figur und Gesichtszüge sind zu tief in mein Innerstes eingeprägt, als daß hier ein Irrtum möglich sein konnte” (DKV 3, 16; “He was dressed differently, but Coppelius’ figure and countenance are too deeply imprinted within me for a mistake to be possible”). “Haltet Ihr, Du und Clara, mich immerhin für einen düstern Träumer, aber nicht los kann ich den Eindruck werden, den Coppelius’ verfluchtes Gesicht auf mich macht” (DKV 3, 20; “You and Clara might consider me to have always been a gloomy dreamer, but I cannot get rid of the impression that Coppelius’ accursed face makes on me”).1

If E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “Der Sandmann” (“The Sandman,” 1816) is a story about the incursion of the “uncanny” into the realm of the familiar and the familial—and if, as Nicole Sütterlin has demonstrated,2 Hoffmann’s rendering of his protagonist’s ensuing psychosis lays the groundwork for a “poetics of trauma” (84) that anticipates and even influences subsequent medical discourses of trauma—then “Der Sandmann” is also, fundamentally, a story about memory. Like Anselmus in “Der Goldne Topf” (“The Golden Pot,” 1814) and Giglio in Prinzessin Brambilla (Princess Brambilla, 1820), Nathaniel is given a glimpse into the flip-side of the quotidian world, but instead of gaining entry into “Atlantis” or “Urdar”— ideal realms associated with poetry, imagination, and freedom—Nathaniel encounters something more like the “Upside Down” from the Netflix series Stranger Things, or the “Black Lodge” from David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: a seedy underbelly of violence, grotesquery, and death, concentrated in the menacing figure of Coppelius/Coppola, equal parts DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-4

The Matter of Memory  49 roboticist, optician, and bugbear. Where Anselmus and Giglio are ultimately able to traverse their respective “Two Worlds”3 by discovering their own artistic identities and by learning to regard critically and ironically the constraints that polite bourgeois society would foist upon them, Nathaniel remains deeply and interminably haunted by the image of Coppelius. Nor is his writing a source of reprieve: if anything, Nathaniel’s letters to Lothar and his subsequent endeavor to write verse about Coppelius serve to fixate his thoughts and reinforce his presentiment that he is the helpless servant of “dunklen Mächten zum grausamen Spiel” (DKV 3, 25; “dark powers engaged in a horrid game”). Like the ghostseeing child who tells Thomas De Quincey that “‘sometimes they come, when I don’t tell them to come’” (67), Nathaniel is haunted by memories whose entrance into consciousness he is powerless to prevent. The quotations that open this essay help us to see that Nathaniel, in fact, has quite specific preconceptions when it comes to memories and how they work: he consistently regards them as marks or imprints left by outside forces on cerebral matter. In the terminology of Enlightenment epistemology, Nathaniel conceives of memory along more or less straightforwardly Lockean associationist lines. By contrast Clara, in her letter entreating Nathaniel to snap out of it and “cheer up,”4 rehearses the Kantian, transcendental idealist view that consciousness precedes and conditions sensory data (rather than that data molding or “imprinting” consciousness, as Locke would have it). Embedded in Clara’s advice is the notion that any power memories might wield over us is power that we freely give to them. Fred Burwick reminds us that Clara’s prognosis misses the mark for much the same reason that Freud’s reading of the tale5 is “inadequate” as literary criticism (259): in their prescriptive approach to Nathaniel’s torment, neither can account for the strange congruence of happenstance details between Nathaniel’s epistolary narrative and the succeeding third-person narrative (itself interspersed with first- and second-person narrative digressions). These details include the recurrence of empty eye-sockets and bloody eyeballs, and of course the fact that Coppelius exists, in the flesh, and is clearly, unmistakably up to no good. Between Nathaniel’s conviction that “dark powers” have an irresistible hold over him, and Clara’s (re)assurance that Nathaniel has ultimate agency over his mind and thus also over any influence that such “dark powers” might exert, Hoffmann offers “contradictory models for reading his text” (Burwick 262). Neither model succeeds in resolving the problem of Coppelius, and while for Burwick this is an integral aspect of the tale’s pervasive and dizzying play of illusion that embroils the reader in the same ambiguities as those faced by its protagonist, it is also, as I argue here, indicative of Hoffmann’s dissatisfaction with the respective philosophies of mind and memory espoused by Nathaniel and Clara. In its opening epistolary exchange as well as in the succeeding narrative, Hoffmann’s “Der Sandmann” is acutely concerned with memory, both as

50  Julian Knox a practical thing that shapes our psychological development, but also as a philosophical concept with its own critical lineage, which too “shapes” us depending on how we reason or assume memory to function. I read “Der Sandmann” as an intervention in this lineage, as a reckoning that in dramatizing the shortcomings of Enlightenment solutions to problems of memory and agency—“solutions” that either invest the object-world with inordinate power or, conversely, upstage it with “pure reason”— looks forward nearly a century to the philosophy of Henri Bergson (1859–1941), whose work responds to those same problems in ways that open up new vantage-points onto the already rich and varied landscape of memory that stretches across European Romanticism writ large. For Bergson, as we shall see, memory properly understood is not a physical, cerebral storehouse but rather a process by which consciousness and the material world constantly engage each other. Neither subject nor object, idealism nor empiricism, claim supremacy in Bergson’s model; the body instead becomes a “centre of action,” a site of “becoming” (MM 178) that calls memory-images forth as it moves through time and space. The two seemingly distinct forms of memory that we experience in daily life— habit or motor-memory on the one hand, and personal or psychological recollection on the other—Bergson reveals as constituent facets of the same overarching process whereby the body (itself an image, and thus not capable of storing images) draws memory-images down from the “pure” or virtual memory (which exists, like a mirror-image, alongside the body) to meet the needs of present action. It is the body acting in the present or “now” that lends memories their life and their power, rather than life or vitality inhering in the memory itself. Formulated as a counter both to associationist models of memory as a material “thing” and to the Kantian disengagement from the purportedly inscrutable world of “things,” Bergson’s philosophy of memory picks up the very same threads that Hoffmann’s critique of memory in “Der Sandmann” lays bare and reasserts the epistemological urgency of the questions that Hoffmann raises in his “uncanny” tale for twentieth-century philosophies of mind.6 Nathaniel believes, as the second sentence of the tale’s opening letter (and the first quote above) indicates, that memory-images—the “Engelsbild,” the “angelic picture,” of Clara—are “eingeprägt,” (“engraved”) upon his “Herz und Sinn” (“heart and mind”). Lest we mistake the language of “einprägen” for a figure of affectionate speech, he repeats this language at least twice more in describing Coppelius in his letters to Lothar (second and third quotes above). Nathaniel invests these memory-images with startling power, as if they have a physical existence, and in turn as if the frequency or magnitude of their presence in consciousness is proportional to the material impression that they have left. Whether part of the zeitgeist or consciously borrowed, Nathaniel’s rhetoric of “imprinting” is central to Enlightenment associationist philosophies of memory, which proceed from Locke’s premise of the mind as a blank slate,7 always accruing, storing, and

The Matter of Memory  51 associating impressions in forming “understanding.”8 In An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690), Locke defines memory as “the storehouse of our ideas” (II.X.2). It stores these ideas by retaining the “imprint” that they have left upon the mind.9 For Locke, strictly speaking, ideas are “nothing but actual perceptions in the mind” (II.X.2) that enter consciousness as ideas when the mind “revive[s] perceptions that it once had, with this additional perception annexed to them, that IT HAS HAD THEM BEFORE” (II.X.2). In other words, ideas are the products of perceptions that have been associated with each other. We may “fix” an idea in the memory through “attention and repetition” (II.X.3), for example by studying arithmetic tables, by which process we effectively bludgeon associations into the mind so as to expedite their recall.10 Alternately, the fixedness of an idea may depend on its relation to our bodily health, which for Locke is an even more powerful agent of impression than conscious repetition: “But those which naturally at first make the deepest and most lasting impressions, are those which are accompanied with pleasure or pain” (II.X.3). All it takes, then, is one particularly powerful experience of pleasure or pain to impact forever the development of the mind. Locke furnishes the example of children learning, from pain, to not repeat an action (such as putting their hand in a fire), but perhaps we can already begin to see how Hoffmann pushes this idea to the extreme in “Der Sandmann.” Here, the source of pain is not being held before a fire—although this, too, happens to Nathaniel when Coppelius accosts him in his father’s laboratory (DKV 3, 17–18)—but rather a far more expansive traumatic experience that involves repeated visits by the same agent of terror, as well as the death of a family member. According to Locke’s associational logic, this experience (or set of experiences) would attain a privileged place in memory, from which it would mediate other perceptions by virtue of being a focal point of association. Its imprint would not only be inexpungable but would indeed determine development insofar as so many ostensibly unrelated perceptions would come into contact with it. To be sure, Locke does accommodate a concept of the will in relation to memory, but he accords it little more power than the volitional summoning and arranging of impressions (II.X.7). In Chapter XI of Book II, he stakes out further “active” mental faculties such as discernment, wit, judgment, comparing, and compounding, but these, too, must be products of experience: for Locke the empiricist, there can be no “innate” principles (I.I.1).11 If the means by which we organize experience must themselves be derived from experience, and if there is no knowledge that precedes experience, then one particularly vivid experience can conceivably determine the specific ways in which we process experience itself. Read in this context, the true horror of Hoffmann’s tale is not the bogeyman Coppelius, but rather the living nightmare of having a mind that works precisely in the way that Locke and his inheritors lay out—a mind, in other words, entirely at the mercy of external forces, which shape it as they dwell in it in the form of memories. As we shall see, Hoffmann

52  Julian Knox redoubles the horror by effectively satirizing its putative “solution,” articulated by Kant in his Kritik der reinen Vernunft (Critique of Pure Reason, 1781). Before we plumb the depths of the vertiginous irony that Hoffmann conjures through this procedure—an irony that in one fell swoop wipes out all of the avenues of contra-associationist critique that would have been available to Hoffmann’s readers—it will be useful to revisit some of the more prominent of those avenues for present-day readers and scholars of Romanticism. Although associationist logic continues to color our discourse today— we speak jokingly, for example, about unsavory images or infectious pop songs “burned into” our brain—later Enlightenment critics of Lockean epistemology (principal among them Kant) were wary of its implications for the rational coherence, and indeed for the ultimate freedom of the human mind, just as Romantic-era writers bolstered these critiques with their own deeply-felt convictions regarding childhood wisdom and the exalted status of the creative imagination and the will. It is over and against the Lockean position that children, like “idiots,” have no innate ideas (I.I.5), that Wordsworth insists children are born “trailing clouds of glory” in the “Intimations” Ode (ln. 64). In other words, children have closer proximity to the virtues that make us human—what Wordsworth elsewhere calls “spontaneous wisdom” (“Tables Turned” ln. 19)—than, sadly, most of their adult counterparts. From a similar vantage point of innate ideas, but which he develops in a rather different direction, Samuel Taylor Coleridge spends several chapters of the Biographia Literaria dismantling associationism on the grounds that it reduces the will to a “blind mechanism” responsible for organizing the “phantasma chaos of association” rather than an active agent necessary for higher-order reasoning (427). For Coleridge, this denigration of the will from agent to mechanism in associationist schematics renders reason itself illusory: We only fancy, that we act from rational resolves, or prudent motives, or from impulses of anger, love, or generosity. In all these cases the real agent is something—nothing—every-thing, which does all of which we know, and knows nothing of all that itself does. (429) To act from “rational resolves”—in other words, to “reason”—is not simply to correlate sensory data in order to generate rules of experience (which in Coleridge’s terms is the work of the “understanding”), but rather to subordinate those rules to a priori principles or laws by which those very postulates or rules derived from experience are possible in the first place. In a grotesque metaphor, Coleridge describes the soul under the scheme of the associationist philosopher David Hartley as a cat in a box, “present only to be pinched or stroked, while the very squeals or purring are produced by an agency wholly independent or alien” (423).

The Matter of Memory  53 Hoffmann’s affection for felines notwithstanding,12 this is also a useful metaphor for how Nathaniel views his own soul, always at the mercy of an outside entity, “eines außer uns selbst liegenden höheren Prinzips” (DKV 3, 29; “a higher principle lying outside of us”),13 the power of which derives in large part from his conviction that this entity has irreversibly imprinted itself on his mind, “marking” him in the same way that Coppelius runs his fingers over the children’s dessert and his lips over their glasses of holiday wine.14 Such occasions are meant to have been special, but have been infected by his touch, just as Nathaniel’s childhood memories—themselves bearing the mark of the sandman—in turn infect his consciousness as he develops into adulthood, rendering it wholly subservient to external triggers such as the (re)appearance of Coppola/ Coppelius and the perspectival distortion facilitated by the spyglass Nathaniel purchases from him. More immediately for Hoffmann, he would have found a similar engagement with associationism in Kant, to whose Kritik der reinen Vernunft Coleridge’s insistence on a unifying, unchanging, a priori basis for perception, for the “making-sense” of sensory impressions, is itself largely indebted. Kant terms this basis or condition for perception “transcendental apperception,” and he defines it as “the unity of consciousness that precedes all data of the intuitions, in relation to which all representation of objects is alone possible” (232).15 By way of unpacking the terminology here, cognition for Kant consists in three stages or faculties, which in the broadest terms he deems “sense,” “imagination,” and “apperception” (225).16 In the first, the mind meets an object, but in fact this is only the appearance of the object in consciousness—for Kant, to “know” an object, or indeed somehow to internalize the object, is a nonsense proposition, since all that we can know is our own consciousness at work. It follows, then, that the intuition of an appearance as an object must always be accompanied (and in fact preceded by) conditions that make the intuition possible in the first place. These conditions cannot be empirical; rather, they must precede experience as the transcendental ground for all possible experience. Each of the three faculties of cognition has a transcendental aspect, or set of a priori conditions, in addition to their empirical use, and accordingly in his explication of these faculties, Kant takes the associationists to task for either deriving their a priori concepts from experience (Hume), or neglecting/refusing to consider them altogether (Locke) (225).17 Kant arrives at the transcendental grounds for the first of these faculties, “sense,” by observing that appearances, even empirically speaking, appeal to, exist in, and are modified by an “inner sense,” and he posits that the formal condition of this “inner sense” is time: Jede Anschauung enthält ein Mannigfaltiges in sich, welches doch nicht als ein solches vorgestellt werden würde, wenn das Gemüth nicht die Zeit in der Folge der Eindrücke auf einander unterschiede:

54  Julian Knox denn als in einem Augenblick enthalten kann jede Vorstellung niemals etwas anderes als absolute Einheit sein. Damit nun aus diesem Mannigfaltigen Einheit der Anschauung werde (wie etwa in der Vorstellung des Raumes), so ist erstlich das Durchlaufen der Mannigfaltigkeit und dann die Zusammennehmung desselben nothwendig, welche Handlung ich die Synthesis der Apprehension nenne. (Kritik 99) Every intuition contains a manifold in itself, which however would not be represented as such if the mind did not distinguish the time in the succession of impressions on one another; for as contained in one moment no representation can ever be anything other than absolute unity. Now in order for unity of intuition to come from this manifold (as, say, in the representation of space), it is necessary first to run through and then to take together this manifoldness, which action I call the synthesis of apprehension. (228–29) I have quoted this passage (mostly) in full because it holds a special relevance for the discussion of Hoffmann in relation to the philosophy of Bergson, who takes exception to the way that Kant thinks about time. For Kant, time works by a logic of succession, in other words by points on a line; moreover, as he states earlier in the Kritik, “Verschiedene Zeiten sind nur Theile eben derselben Zeit” (Kritik 32; “Different times are only parts of one and the same time” [162]). As the transcendental condition of sense, “die Synthesis der Apprehension” (Kritik 99; “the synthesis of apprehension”) facilitates the recognition of a unity in all of the manifold aspects or qualities that arise successively, through time, in the intuition of an object. Likewise, with regard to the second faculty of cognition, “imagination,” there must be a formal unity or organizational structure that precedes and directs our reproduction of representations, or what Locke would call the association of representations. Put simply, these representations cannot be trusted to synthesize their own associations with one another. Were they able to do so, even what Kant calls our “empirische Einbildungskraft” (Kritik 100; “empirical imagination” [229])—which for Locke is our entire understanding—would cease to function properly, and our subjectivity would be something like Nathaniel’s, entirely at the whim of associations forged by whatever external forces impact us most powerfully. Hence for Kant there must be an a priori “die Synthesis der Reproduktion” (Kritik 100–02; “synthesis of reproduction”) that works hand-in-hand with the synthesis of apprehension. Kant now again takes recourse to the logic of time as succession when he posits that there must be a fundamental unity of consciousness

The Matter of Memory  55 that precedes all of our representations, because without it we would fail to register the succession of these representations: each representation would be new and would be unaccompanied by the recognition that the representation consists of a manifold that reveals itself successively. This unity of consciousness or unity of the self that makes all experience possible is what Kant calls “die transcendentale Apperception” (Kritik 107; “transcendental apperception”), on which rests his entire thesis that it is not objects that constitute and give rise to the self, but rather quite the opposite (232–33). Applying the principles of Kantian transcendental apperception to the associationist assumptions regarding perception held by Nathaniel, it would be easy to diagnose his situation with regards to the memory of Coppelius as an unfortunate case of a mind that has unwittingly given up its freedom by persisting in thinking empirically—i.e., by allowing the “imprinted” memory of Coppelius to organize his own consciousness—thereby ceding power to an external object that this object, Coppelius (in the Kantian view) never properly had in the first place. The problem, however, from which so much of Hoffmann’s perplexing irony in this tale arises, is that this is also precisely the solution that Clara articulates in her letter to Nathaniel, where she insists that the “dark power” he associates with Coppelius is entirely in his head: Gibt es eine dunkle Macht, die so recht feindlich und verräterisch einen Faden in unser Inneres legt, woran sie uns dann festpackt und fortzieht auf einem gefahrvollen verderblichen Wege, den wir sonst nicht betreten haben würden—gibt es eine solche Macht, so muß sie in uns sich, wie wir selbst gestalten, ja unser Selbst werden; denn nur so glauben wir an sie und räumen ihr den Platz ein, dessen sie bedarf, um jenes geheime Werk zu vollbringen. (DKV 3, 18) If there is a dark power which hostilely and traitorously fixes a thread to our inner sense, which grabs hold of us and drags us along a dangerous and depraved path that we would not otherwise have trod—if there is such a power, it must be inside of us, must be formed like us, indeed must be us; only then can we believe in it and give it the room it requires to complete its mysterious work. The concepts of clarity (“Klarheit”) and enlightenment (“Aufklärung”) that Clara’s name connotes are of a piece with the epistemology that she here articulates. To think “clearly,” for her, is to think in terms of Kantian apperception, which is to recognize that the self sets the terms for all objects that enter consciousness as representations. In other words,

56  Julian Knox according to Clara there is no “dark power” that exists without an idea or principle of this power preexisting in Nathaniel in the first place. Were this in fact the case, the story would end here, the couple would live happily ever after, and the story would be anthologized as a practical application of Kantian metaphysics in Romantic literature. As it stands, however, Hoffmann’s ensuing third-person narrative pointedly shows us Nathaniel struggling to synthesize Clara’s (and Kant’s) ideas in any sort of productive fashion. First, he grows more entrenched in his position, even expressing “Verstimmung” (“resentment”) about her unwelcome advice in his second letter to Lothar (DKV 3, 25), before declaring in the third-person narrative that the “power” of which Clara speaks must be a “higher principle lying outside of us”18 and that Coppelius in turn is this principle. The largest sign of the inefficacy of Clara’s advice, however, is not Nathaniel’s stubborn resistance to it, but appears instead at the moment when this stubbornness abates and Nathaniel admits that “bei Gott Bruder! ich war auf schlimmen Wege, aber zu rechter Zeit leitete mich ein Engel auf den lichten Pfad!—Ach es war ja Clara” (DKV 3, 48; “By God, brother! I was on a perilous path, but at just the right time an Angel led me to the path of light!—It was indeed Clara”)! Notice here how the language of dangerous “paths” that Clara had employed in her letter is now Nathaniel’s language, which he at last employs in the service of diagnosing his own situation. However, these are also Nathaniel’s last coherent words before he raises the spyglass to his eye on the tower, begins to laugh and shriek maniacally, and grapples with Clara and then Lothar before hurling himself to the ground below. If “Der Sandmann” is a tale about the perils of associational memory and the freedom that we necessarily give up in assuming that our consciousness is empirically derived, it is also a parable of the failure of Kantian apperception to resolve such a conundrum practically. Coppelius is no mere projection or phantom, nor is he simply an embodiment of oedipal anxieties or castration-complexes: he exists corporeally, and in such a way that palpably and unforgettably influences Nathaniel’s life. It is here in Nathaniel’s memory—and in the relation of memory to present and future life—that Coppelius’ influence is most concentrated, and where he can act upon Nathaniel without even being physically present. As a variation on his signature theme of “the Two Worlds” mentioned at the start of this essay, Hoffmann’s tale dramatizes two ways to theorize memory, both of which he would have known from Enlightenment philosophical traditions, and neither of which he found fully satisfactory. Bergson, too, was dissatisfied with these particular approaches to the issue of memory and how each tilts too heavily to one side or the other of the subject– object divide. He addresses these concerns in his second book, Matière et mémoire (Matter and Memory, 1896), in which he posits that memory is “the point of contact between consciousness and matter” (81). For Bergson, memory cannot be entirely associational, for this would be to conflate mind with brain, and to materialize thought into “so many independent

The Matter of Memory  57 entities floating, like the atoms of Epicurus, in an inward space” in a way that renders consciousness merely a passive receptor, devoid of will (213). On the other hand, to prioritize the intuiting subject over and above matter is to understate the relation of memory to motor reflexes and, as Bergson believed Kant had done, to obscure the fact that the body—which does not store memories per se, but whose sensations and movements condition how memories are called up into consciousness—exists, like memory, not solely in space but, more importantly, in time. Indeed, among the areas where Hoffmann most powerfully anticipates Bergson is in his representation of the nature of time—a nature that is not, as Kant would have it, strictly linear, but that is rather more holistic and, crucially, varied. In a beautiful explication of Bergson’s dictum that “I must, willy nilly, wait until the sugar melts” (Creative Evolution 9), Gilles Deleuze states that this “signifies that my own duration, such as I live it in the impatience of waiting, for example, serves to reveal other durations that beat to other rhythms, that differ in kind from mine” (32). The duration of the sugar melting is not the same as the duration experienced by Bergson as he waits, just as our experience of time as stretched-out or slow-moving as we wait for a letter or visitor is different from the inevitably sped-up sense of time experienced by the mail-carrier on their route or by the visitor who is “running late.” What the hybrid epistolary/thirdperson-narrative form of Hoffmann’s tale shows us is that Nathaniel’s relationship to time as he ponders childhood memories and applies them to his present circumstances is different from Clara’s, who is waiting, as it were, for him to grow out of his childhood fixations and enter adulthood. Hoffmann’s narrator further dramatizes these differences in the experience of time as he tells us of Nathaniel waiting by his window for three days in hopes that the curtains to Olimpia’s chamber will open, during which time “Clara’s Bild war ganz aus seinem Innern gewichen” (DKV 3, 37; “Clara’s image was entirely expunged from his inner sense”), just as her image, along with Nathaniel’s consciousness of his mother and Lothar, disappear entirely as he later sits beside Olimpia “täglich stundenlang” (DKV 3, 38; “every day, hour after hour”). These examples reveal how Nathaniel’s associationist thinking orders and elides images in his consciousness according to what Locke would call “attention and repetition” (II.X.3), but they also show the drastically different ways in which he experiences time. This is also a feature of Hoffmann’s “Der goldne Topf” (“Golden Pot,” 1814) in which Anselmus’ consciousness of time (and also of work) disappears entirely as he translates Archivarius Lindhorst’s hieroglyphic manuscripts, just as it is a formal feature of Hoffmann’s novel Lebensansichten des Katers Murr (The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr, 1819–21), which features two disparate narratives that not only never merge together, but that indeed operate on entirely different timescales, one being the autobiography of a cat and the other a thirdperson tale involving events in the life of Johannes Kreisler.19

58  Julian Knox For Bergson—and, as we have been tracing it here, for Hoffmann—the passing of time is a decidedly more organic phenomenon than both the associationist and transcendental idealist traditions have allowed. In his first book, Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience (Time and Free Will: An Essay on the Immediate Data of Consciousness, 1889), Bergson approaches the question of how time passes by first dealing with what time is not. As Bergson puts it here, our problem with time as we commonly conceive it, and which is reinforced by things like clocks, is that we impose space onto time and thus muddle both. In our quotidian consciousness of time, we take various points of succession and map them onto space, onto a line, and thereby create a continuity. This is not, however, pure time, or what Bergson calls “pure duration”: Pure duration is the form which the succession of our conscious states assumes when our ego lets itself live, when it refrains from separating its present state from its former states. For this purpose it need not be entirely absorbed in the passing sensation or idea; for then, on the contrary, it would no longer endure. Nor need it forget its former states: it is enough that, in recalling these states, it does not set them alongside its actual state as one point alongside another, but forms both the past and the present states into an organic whole, as happens when we recall the notes of a tune, melting, so to speak into one another. (Time and Free Will 100) Bergson’s musical metaphor is apt for Hoffmann, who composed music in addition to writing about composers real and fictional, but so is the fact that Bergson grounds his theory on a critique of Kant, whose ideas— as we have seen—appear in “Der Sandmann,” only to fail as a solution to Nathaniel’s epistemological problems. Kant’s “great mistake,” as Bergson calls it, is that he took time as a homogeneous medium, confusing its operation with space, without noticing that “real duration is made up of moments inside one another” (232), and which in turn reveals our inner states “as living things, constantly becoming, as states not amenable to measure” and which “permeate one another” (231). For Bergson, such recognition requires deep introspection and is exceedingly rare, “and that is just why we are rarely free” (231). Even though Bergson regards Kant as a thinker “whose belief in freedom remained unshakable” (232) and whose systematic refutation of associationism is a crucial step towards a unified philosophy of mind, his repeated descriptions of time using the terms of space—as a mere succession on a line or plane rather than as pure duration (which neither functions nor can be described spatially)— means for Bergson that the conscious subject must always regard his psychic states as constantly, ceaselessly determining one another, even if—and perhaps indeed because—there is a transcendental ground that preserves their unity by deriving that unity from succession. Applied to Hoffmann,

The Matter of Memory  59 Bergson’s thought shows us how both Nathaniel’s and Clara’s respective approaches to the issue of memory are mired in illusions of linear space, of space masquerading as time. For Nathaniel, he cannot detach himself from an associationist line leading directly back to the childhood trauma concerning Coppelius, who has in Nathaniel’s view forever marked the physical space of his brain. For Clara, this same line, interpreted differently, means that the past has passed and thus can no longer be present or relevant. Indeed, she continues to live along this line at the end of the story, settling down with a “friendly” man, having two “merry”20 boys, and leading, somehow, a happy life. In Bergson’s philosophy, this is not how time, nor our memory of past time, actually works; the notion of the past—or specifically a past experience—as a point on a line that determines the next point, all the way up to our present, which is itself always vanishing the moment we try to pin it down, is a “mechanical explanation of a fact” which we have inadvertently and by force of habit substituted for the fact itself (Time and Free Will 181). As he puts it in Matter and Memory, this misconception means that we would find “only a difference of degree” (176) between present and past, perception and memory, when in fact there is a fundamental difference in kind: But there is much more between past and present than a mere difference of degree. My present is that which interests me, which lives for me, and, in a word, that which summons me to action; whereas my past is essentially powerless. (176) This is not to say that the past does not exist, but rather that it is relevant to us only insofar as our present utilizes it. Proceeding from Bergson’s definition of duration as a “continuous flow,” which is itself experienced differently by everyone and everything, our present is concerned only with the “unfolding” or “unrolling” of experience (Matter and Memory 194). Our present always renews itself, and in turn “our body is nothing but that part of our representation which is ever being born again, the part always present” which constitutes at every moment “a section of the universal becoming” (196). Because the body is itself an image or alwaysrenewing representation, by definition it cannot, for Bergson, store up or be the physical repository of memories. What Bergson calls “true memory,” on the other hand, always simply is: coextensive with our consciousness, it moves in the past and not in the ever-renewing present. To illustrate this theory, Bergson offers his famous diagram of an inverted cone perched atop a flat plane, the base of the cone AB representing all of the subject’s memories and its pointed end S signifying those memories called into consciousness as the body moves forward in time on the “shifting plane of experience” P (Matter and Memory 197).

60  Julian Knox

Figure 2.1 Bergson’s “memory cone”. Sketched by the author (original from Chapter III of Bergson’s Matter and Memory).

As Bergson insists, “it is from the present that comes the appeal to which memory responds” (197), and not the other way around. In other words, memory cannot dictate our present experience, as the associationists would have it. On the contrary, our body, in action in the realm of experience, calls up memories as it needs them, a process by which a memory “borrows the warmth which gives it life” (197). It might be disconcerting in the context of “pure duration” as a concept that resists definition through spatial paradigms, however, that Bergson has given us none other than a spatial representation of consciousness in duration, in the ever-unfolding present P, as it calls up memories from the past. Amanda Paxton argues with reference to this diagram that Bergson ultimately “produced a model that invokes elements of the distributed paradigm of associationist thought” (674)—that he has spatialized and materialized memory “in a way that renders thoughts objects, ideas things, thereby nullifying the quest for a transcendent, holistic self in a way surprisingly close to associationism” (661). Deleuze, however, anticipates such deductions in his book on Bergson, where he offers the crucial clarification that we have great difficulty in understanding a survival of the past in itself because we believe that the past is no longer, that it has ceased to be. We have thus confused Being with being-present. Nevertheless, the present is not; rather, it is pure becoming, always outside itself. It is not, but it acts. Its proper element is not being but the active or the useful. The past, on the other hand, has ceased to act or be useful. But it has not ceased to be. Useless and inactive, impassive, it IS, in the full sense of the word: It is identical with being in itself. (55) The difference “in kind” between past and present boils down to ontology. Because “pure memory” belongs to the past, which itself “IS” and thus belongs to Being—against which the present or “pure duration”

The Matter of Memory  61 belongs to becoming, or what Deleuze calls “being-present”—pure memory must be “virtual, inactive, and unconscious” (55). Despite the diagram, which is limited by figuration and by language, as Bergson repeatedly admits in Time and Free Will and Matter and Memory, the past and the memories that constitute it are not by nature spatial or material. This is why, for Bergson, pure memory must be a “spiritual manifestation. With memory we are in very truth in the domain of the spirit” (Matter and Memory 320). How does all of this help poor Nathaniel? How might it, at least, help us to understand his conundrum from a vantage-point besides that of empirical association (which would hold that he merely needs to collect more positive representations in consciousness that would counter or mediate those associated with Coppelius), and besides that of transcendental apperception (which holds, as Clara does, that he must subordinate his associations to a unified concept of self as an a priori determining agent)? We might posit, following Bergson’s diagram, that there is a weight perched atop his “memory cone” in the shape of Coppelius, which causes it to topple and shatter, like Nathaniel, onto a world he can no longer fathom. But this would be to ascribe materiality and spatiality to a concept that, as Deleuze reminds us, must be “virtual” insofar as it belongs to Being and not to action, and which thus would plunge us right back into the empirical mire of association that Bergson is invested in dispelling. In the pages immediately following his diagram of the cone touching the plane of experience, Bergson considers the constitution of what he calls a “‘well-balanced’ mind, that is to say, in fact, a man nicely adapted to life” (Matter and Memory 198). At one extreme, an individual whose consciousness dwells, as it were, at the summit of the cone, and which recalls only those memory-images of immediate relevance to present experience, is for Bergson a “man of impulse,” hardly different from “the lower animals” (198). At the opposite extreme is the “dreamer,” who dwells in memory “for the mere pleasure of living there, and in whom recollections emerge into the light of consciousness without any advantage for the present situation” (198). Although we cannot claim Nathaniel takes “pleasure” in his traumatic memories without ascribing to him a certain masochism which is more properly in the realm of psychoanalysis (and thus beyond the scope of this essay), we can nonetheless readily perceive that Nathaniel spends a majority of the text occupying and living in his memories. The only time at which he might be said to live prolongedly in the present is in the company of the automaton Olimpia. Significantly for us, Bergson employs this exact terminology when he recapitulates the two extremes of consciousness later in the same chapter: A human being who should dream his life instead of living it would no doubt thus keep before his eyes at each moment the infinite multitude of the details of his past history. And, on the other hand, the

62  Julian Knox man who should repudiate this memory with all that it begets would be continually acting his life instead of truly representing it to himself: a conscious automaton, he would follow the lead of useful habits which prolong into an appropriate reaction the stimulation received. (201) Hoffmann ironically puts the dreamer in conversation with the automaton. Olimpia responds to every prompt with the same exact words: “Ach, ach!” (DKV 3, 36; “Ah, ah!”). Nathaniel in turn responds to these words by reading them as an intuitive and profound reflection of his entire emotional history: “Du Strahl aus dem verheißenen Jenseits der Liebe—du tiefes Gemüt, in dem sich mein ganzes Sein spiegelt” (DKV 3, 36; “You ray shining from the promised realm of love—you deep soul, who mirrors my very being”). Aside from the obvious comic effect, there is a dark irony in what Bergson would call the two “extremes” of consciousness having a conversation with one another. Nathaniel might appear as if he is living in the present, since at this point all memories of Clara and his family have been expunged from consciousness, but he is in fact mediating his experience with Olimpia entirely through his memory of having been an aspiringly profound poet, which vocation was itself brought about in the first place by his memory of Coppelius. His mind remains wholly and helplessly associational and thus mechanical in its workings, which Hoffmann hammers home by putting him opposite a being whose mind is indeed physically composed of wires and mechanisms. The optical motif that runs through the tale in the form of spectacles and spyglasses21 further reinforces the nature of his mind as entirely subservient to simple stimuli which trigger associations that in turn manifest outlandish and absurd actions. The deeper, devastating irony of the tale lies, then, in the fact that the dreamer is just as much an automaton as is Olimpia, and in the attendant possibility that all of us, despite the assurances we muster in both philosophical and quotidian discourse of ourselves as freely acting agents, are ultimately slaves to the inscrutable mechanisms that constitute consciousness. Lest we resign ourselves to accepting this as the ultimate import of Hoffmann’s seemingly all-consuming irony in “Der Sandmann,” Bergson offers us an additional model for thinking about the problem that, I argue, is consistent with Hoffmann’s ideas in his other, less existentially devasting works. In describing the specific workings of the memory cone as it interacts with our consciousness of the present, Bergson states that Memory, laden with the whole of the past, responds to the appeal of the present state by two simultaneous movements, one of translation, by which it moves in its entirety to meet experience, thus contracting more or less, though without dividing, with a view to action; the

The Matter of Memory  63 other of rotation upon itself, by which it turns towards the situation of the present, presenting to it that side of itself which may prove to be the most useful. (Matter and Memory 220) These twin processes of translation and rotation are crucial to Bergson’s conception of memory, which does not simply and suddenly impose itself from the depths onto consciousness, but which instead undergoes a mediation requisite to the demands of the present. As we have seen, such mediation is entirely anathema to the way in which Nathaniel conducts himself, which is always to dwell in extremes of terror or joy, but it is there in Anselmus, who in “Der Goldne Topf” assumes none other than the vocation of translator. Strictly speaking, of course, he is a copyist of Lindhorst’s manuscripts, but Hoffmann makes it clear in his descriptions of this process that there is something more going on than mere slavish copying or transcription. For one thing, when Anselmus’ work is at its best, it is accompanied by the encouraging whispers of Lindhorst’s daughter Serpentina. More importantly, when Anselmus realizes in transcribing the strange and foreign characters of Lindhorst’s manuscripts that “er schreibe nur längst gekannte Züge auf das Pergament hin und dürfe kaum nach dem Original sehen, um alles mit der größten Genauigkeit nachzumalen” (DKV 2, 284; “he is writing familiar characters on the parchment and now hardly needed to refer back to the original, in order to reproduce it all with the greatest exactitude”), it becomes clear that he is translating something of his own self that is already present in the manuscript. What once was alien and impregnable has become familiar and legible—quite the opposite of “unheimlich” or uncanny—through the act of translation. Why, then, does writing not work in the same revelatory way for Nathaniel, who from the very outset of “Der Sandmann” writes letters and poetry into which, as far as we can tell, he has poured all of himself? In Bergson’s terms, this is because Nathaniel has replaced his “real and concrete self,” which exists in pure duration and is always in the process of becoming, with its “symbolical substitute” (Time and Free Will 139), which is a “colourless shadow” (231) projected out into homogenous time and space by an ego that has convinced itself that these, too, are its own conditions. Accordingly, the “drama enacted in the theatre of consciousness” (149)—the drama that forms the substance of Nathaniel’s committed (if misguided) attempts at introspection—is not a genuine translation of memory into consciousness, and in turn of the self into the surrounding world, but is instead a “literal and even slavish translation of some scenes performed by the molecules and atoms of organized matter” (149). One of the problems with language itself, for Bergson, is that “we instinctively tend to solidify our impressions,” which are always changing, always becoming, “in order to express them in language” (130). Language, in turn, can “make us believe in the unchangeableness

64  Julian Knox of our sensations” (131). In this context, Nathaniel’s recourse to writing, tragically, merely reinforces his assumptions regarding the power that his memories (and Coppelius) wield over his consciousness. Hoffmann has already, however, shown in “Der goldne Topf” that language need not work in this way, because it is also the prime and perhaps the only means by which we translate between realms of experience in order to elucidate their holistic interconnection.22 As he puts it in the tale’s concluding sentence, “Ist denn überhaupt des Anselmus Seligkeit etwas anderes als das Leben in der Poesie, der sich der heilige Einklang aller Wesen als tiefstes Geheimnis der Natur offenbaret?” (DKV 2, 321; “Is the bliss of Anselmus anything else but life in poetry, poetry to which the sacred harmony of all things is revealed as the most profound secret of Nature?”). Language for Bergson might well be limiting when it seeks to represent our everunfolding impressions or sensations in pure duration, but for Hoffmann (as well as, ultimately, for Bergson, who constantly modifies and recasts his ideas over the course of his body of work) it is the privileged means by which we express such unfoldings and interconnections, especially when it is understood not just as writing, but also as visual and musical composition—all of which figure into Hoffmann’s representational praxis, and all of which serve as means of translation between self and world as well as between each other. “Translation” is crucial for Bergson when it comes to mediating between memory and matter, but so is “rotation,” the second (but in fact simultaneous) process by which pure memory presents its most useful aspect to consciousness. In a related sense, the metaphor of circles is equally essential to Bergson’s thought taken in totum, just as it is for Hoffmann. Duration exists as moments inhering in one another, radiating like the rings of Saturn but always in contact, in the same way as the notes of a tune melting into another. Some visualizations of sound, which we can call up in iTunes and in similar applications, actually present sound in this way, as emanating circles. And, of course, we are here describing time in means of space, but only as an illustration, and not as a substitute for the concept. In Hoffmann’s case, it is pertinent in this regard that the character of his most like him is Johannes Kreisler, of the Kreisleriana and Kater Murr, a character whose name, “circler,” suggests an alternative model of self-understanding that accommodates contingency and change without erasing or otherwise eliding them, as would a line moving from one fixed point to another. In a notebook entry from his Roman sojourn of 1806, Coleridge writes of “The quiet circle in which Change and Permanence co-exist, not by combination or juxtaposition, but by an absolute annihilation of difference / column of smoke, the fountains before St. Peters, waterfalls / God!—Change without loss” (Notebooks 2: 282). Although Hoffmann could not have known of this formulation, it describes with remarkable clarity those affirmative aspects of Kreislerian circularity that counter the linear-progressive impetus of time and

The Matter of Memory  65 memory misconceived as space by reconceiving time itself as immanent, as a “quiet circle” in which nothing is lost as the self comes into shape and inevitably changes shape.23 In the same way, as Bergson posits, memories change shape, so that the moment we fix them is also the moment that we pervert time, and thus pervert true becoming, the “living reality” (Matter and Memory 171) constituted and ever reconstituted by the dynamic interplay of the virtual memory and the material body. It is in this moment that we give up our freedom, and breed Coppelian sandmen of the mind.

Notes 1 E.T.A. Hoffmann “Der Sandmann,” pp. 11–49 in Nachtstücke, Klein Zaches, Prinzessin Brambilla: Werke 1816-1820. Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden, vol. 3, ed. Hartmut Steinecke with collab. of Gerhard Allroggen (Frankfurt: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985 [2009]). (Cited as DKV 3 in the text) All translations from Hoffmann are mine. 2 See Sütterlin, especially pp. 33–36. 3 For more on Hoffmann’s theme of the “Two Worlds,” which is an appellation applied to his work by Coleridge, see my articles “Coleridge’s ‘CousinGerman’: Blackwood’s, Alter-Egos, and the Making of a Man of Letters” in European Romantic Review 21.4, 425–46, and “Hoffmann’s ‘Two Worlds’ and the Problem of Life-Writing” in E. T. A. Hoffmann: Transgressive Romanticism, ed. Christopher R. Clason, Liverpool UP, 2018, 191–211. 4 “Sei heiter – heiter!” (DKV 3, 23). 5 Sigmund Freud, “Das Unheimliche” (“The Uncanny,” 1919). Burwick also reminds us that Hoffmann already satirizes reductive criticism within the tale via the “Professor of Poetics and Rhetoric” [“Der Professor der Poesie und Beredsamkeit” (DKV 3, 46)] who, after the grotesque conclusion of the Olimpia-episode, insists that “Das Ganze ist eine Allegorie—eine fortgeführte Metapher—Sie verstehen mich!—Sapienti sat!” (46; “The whole thing is an allegory—an extended metaphor—surely you understand—that is all we need to know!”). 6 As his most recent English-language editors assert, Bergson “anticipates many of the recent moves made in the philosophy of mind, such as the stress on approaching perception not in terms representational but rather as bound up with the action and movement of a body, and on consciousness as an emergent property of a network or assemblage of components; it is only abstractly that we can separate brain, body and world” (Key Writings 15). 7 The specific term that Locke uses is “white paper”: “Let us then suppose the mind to be, as we say, white paper, void of all characters, without any ideas” (II.I.2). The term “tabula rasa” (blank slate) never actually appears in Locke’s Essay. 8 Strictly speaking, associationism traces its roots back to Aristotle, who in the second chapter of his treatise On Memory ascribes processes of association to our organization of recollections (Complete Works [Princeton, 1984] 717– 20). In his critique of associationism in Chapters V-VIII of the Biographia Literaria, Coleridge is careful to distinguish Aristotle from the Enlightenment associationists, who extended the process of association from memory to virtually all mental activity (Coleridge’s Poetry and Prose 421–39). 9 As Locke puts it in Book II, Chapter X of the Essay, there are two ways in which we retain ideas. One is “contemplation,” or keeping an idea “for some time actually in view,” while “The other way of retention is, the power to

66  Julian Knox revive again in our minds those ideas which, after imprinting, have disappeared, or have been as it were laid aside out of sight” (II.X.1–2). Locke uses some form of the word “imprint” 58 times in the Essay, always with reference to the mind being acted upon. 10 This is, indeed, largely the modus operandi of books on “artificial memory,” or memorization—such as Richard Grey’s Memoria Technica: or, A New Method of Artificial Memory (1730)—that enjoyed popular success in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. 11 See the first three chapters of Book I of the Essay for Locke’s explication of this position. 12 Hoffmann’s final novel is narrated in part by a cat, as its title advertises: The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr together with a fragmentary Biography of Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler on Random Sheets of Waste Paper (Lebensansichten des Katers Murr nebst fragmentarischer Biographie des Kapellmeisters Johannes Kreisler in zufälligen Makulaturblättern 1819–21). A statue of Hoffmann holding Murr on his shoulder stands in the Hoffmannplatz in Bamberg, where he lived and worked from 1808 to 1813. 13 Reading “Der Sandmann” in this way as a critique of the associationist assumptions inherent in Nathaniel’s thinking, one might argue that in the absence of a coherent unifying principle for his perceptions and memories, Nathaniel confuses Coppelius himself with such a “higher principle,” to which he immediately and willingly cedes all agency. 14 “Die ganze Figur war überhaupt widrig und abscheulich; aber vor allem waren uns Kindern seine großen knotigten, haarigten Fäuste zuwider, so daß wir, was er damit berührte, nicht mehr mochten. Das hatte er bemerkt und nun war es seine Freude, irgend ein Stückchen Kuchen, oder eine süße Frucht, die uns die gute Mutter heimlich auf den Teller gelegt, unter diesem, oder jenem Vorwande zu berühren, daß wir, helle Tränen in den Augen, die Näscherei, der wir uns erfreuen sollten, nicht mehr genießen mochten vor Ekel und Abscheu. Eben so machte er es, wenn uns an Feiertagen der Vater ein klein Gläschen süßen Weins eingeschenkt hatte. Dann fuhr er schnell mit der Faust herüber, oder brachte wohl gar das Glas an die blauen Lippen und lachte recht teuflisch, wenn wir unsern Ärger nur leise schluchzend äußern durften” (DKV 3, 15–16; “He cut an altogether repellant and loathsome figure; but we children were above all else revolted by his large, gnarled, hairy hands, so that whatever he touched with them, we no longer desired. This he noticed, and henceforth it was his joy, under this or that pretext to touch whatever little piece of cake or sweet fruit that mother had snuck onto our plates, so that, with tears welling in our eyes, the tidbit we were meant to enjoy filled us instead with disgust and revulsion. He did this also on holidays, when father would treat us to a small glass of sweet wine. Then he would quickly brush his hand over it, or bring the glass right to his blue lips and laugh fiendishly as we muffled our indignation with quiet sobs”). 15 “Nun können keine Erkenntnisse in uns stattfinden, keine Verknüpfung und Einheit derselben unter einander, ohne diejenige Einheit des Bewusstseins, welche vor allen Datis der Anschauungen vorhergeht, und worauf in Beziehung alle Vorstellung von Gegenständen allein möglich ist” (107). This passage is from the first edition of Kant’s Kritik. For English translations, I have followed the standard Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, which interpolates material from the first and second editions of the Kritik. 16 “Es sind aber drei ursprüngliche Quellen (Fähigkeiten oder Vermögen der Seele), die die Bedingungen der Möglichkeit aller Erfahrung enthalten und

The Matter of Memory  67 selbst aus keinem andern Vermögen des Gemüths abgeleitet werden können, nämlich Sinn, Einbildungskraft, und Apperception” (Kritik 94; “There are, however, three original sources (capacities or faculties of the soul), which contain the conditions of the possibility of all experience, and cannot themselves be derived from any other faculty of the mind, namely sense, imagination, and apperception”). 17 Kant’s discussion of Locke and Hume in the “Doctrine of Elements” (“Elementarlehre”) appears in the second (1787) edition of the Kritik: “Der berühmte Locke hatte, aus Ermangelung dieser Betrachtung, und weil er reine Begriffe des Verstandes in der Erfahrung antraf, sie auch von der Erfahrung abgeleitet, und verfuhr doch so inkonsequent, daß er damit Versuche zu Erkenntnissen wagte, die weit über alle Erfahrungsgrenze hinausgehen. David Hume erkannte, um das letztere tun zu können, sei es notwendig, daß diese Begriffe ihren Ursprung a priori haben müßten. Da er sich aber gar nicht erklären konnte, wie es möglich sei, daß der Verstand Begriffe, die an sich im Verstande nicht verbunden sind, doch als im Gegenstande notwendig verbunden denken müsse, und darauf nicht verfiel, daß vielleicht der Verstand durch diese Begriffe selbst Urheber der Erfahrung, worin seine Gegenstände angetroffen werden, sein könne, so leitete er sie, durch Not gedrungen, von der Erfahrung ab” (Kritik 127; “The famous Locke, from neglect of this consideration, and because he encountered pure concepts of the understanding in experience, also derived them from this experience, and thus proceeded so inconsistently that he thereby dared to make attempts at cognitions that go far beyond the boundary of all experience. David Hume recognized that in order to be able to do the latter it is necessary that these concepts would have to have their origin a priori. But since he could not explain at all how it is possible for the understanding to think of concepts that in themselves are not combined in the understanding as still necessarily combined in the object, and it never occurred to him that perhaps the understanding itself, by means of these concepts, could be the originator of the experience in which its objects are encountered, he thus, driven by necessity, derived them from experience”). 18 See n. 17 above. 19 See the contribution by Christopher R. Clason in this volume. 20 “Nach mehreren Jahren will man in einer entfernten Gegend Clara gesehen haben, wie sie mit einem freundlichen Mann, Hand in Hand vor der Türe eines schönen Landhauses saß und vor ihr zwei muntre Knaben spielen” (DKV 3, 49). 21 Bergson notably likens his memory-cone in Chapter III of Matter and Memory to a telescope, but with the opposite effect of the spyglass that Coppola sells to Nathaniel: “We have supposed that our entire personality, with the totality of our recollections, is present, undivided within our actual perception. Then, if this perception evokes in turn different memories, it is not by a mechanical adjunction of more and more numerous elements which, while it remains itself unmoved, it attracts around it, but rather by an expansion of the entire consciousness which, spreading out over a larger area, discovers the fuller detail of its wealth. So a nebulous mass, seen through more and more powerful telescopes, resolves itself into an ever greater number of stars” (215–16). When Nathaniel uses Coppola’s telescope, which he aims only at Olimpia and Clara and (oddly) never at the stars, it narrows and distorts his vision, and mechanically triggers outlandish emotional responses. Bergon’s telescope metaphor, by contrast, illustrates how memory, through a double movement of “contraction and expansion” (216) perpetually connects the needs of the

68  Julian Knox present moment (indicated by Point S on the cone-diagram) with the vast cosmos of “pure” or virtual memory (indicated by the base AB of the cone). Just as Bergson’s cone-diagram is a spatial representation of decidedly nonspatial phenomena (time, memory, and consciousness), the telescope-metaphor utilizes a mechanical object to describe a thoroughly organic process. The telescope in Hoffmann’s tale, like Olimpia herself, is a mechanical object that draws our attention to the mechanical nature of Nathaniel’s associational response to stimuli. 22 In The Statesman’s Manual, Coleridge terms this the “hidden mystery in every the minutest form of existence, which… freed from the phaenomena of time and space, reveals itself to the pure reason as the actual immanence or inbeing of all in each” (Lay Sermons 251–52). 23 Bergson, too, describes memory in terms of circles: “Neither does the localizing of a recollection consist in inserting it mechanically among other memories, but in describing, by an increasing expansion of the memory as a whole, a circle large enough to include this detail from the past” (Matter and Memory 322).

Works Cited Aristotle. The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation. Ed. Jonathan Barnes. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1984. Bergson, Henri. Creative Evolution. Trans. Arthur Mitchell. New York: Henry Holt, 1911a. ———. Key Writings. Ed. Keith Ansell Pearson and John Ó Maoilearca. London and New York: Bloomsbury, 2002. ———. Matter and Memory. Trans. Nancy Margaret Paul and W. Scott Palmer. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1911b. ———. Time and Free Will: An Essay on the Immediate Data of Consciousness. Trans. F.L. Pogson. London: Swan Sonnenschein, 1910. Burwick, Frederick. The Haunted Eye: Perception and the Grotesque in English and German Romanticism. Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1987. Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Coleridge’s Poetry and Prose. Ed. Nicholas Halmi, Paul Magnuson, and Raimonda Modiano. New York and London: Norton, 2004. ———. Lay Sermons. Ed. H.N. Coleridge. London: William Pickering, 1839. ———. The Notebooks of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Ed. Kathleen Coburn. 5 vols. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1957–1990. De Quincey, Thomas. Confessions of an English Opium-Eater and Other Writings. Ed. Robert Morrison. Oxford, UK: Oxford UP, 2013. Deleuze, Gilles. Bergsonism. Trans. Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberjam. Brooklyn, NY: Zone Books, 1988. Duffer Brothers, creators. Stranger Things. 21 Laps Entertainment and Monkey Massacre, 2016. Netflix, https://www.netflix.com/watch/80077368. Freud, Sigmund. “The Uncanny.” An Infantile Neurosis and Other Works. Vol. XVII (1917-1919) of The Standard Edition of the Works of Sigmund Freud. Ed. James Strachey. 24 vols. London, et al.: Vintage, 1999. 217–56. Hoffmann, E.T.A. Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden [= DKV]. Ed. Hartmut Steinecke, Gerhard Allroggen, and Wulf Segebrecht. Frankfurt a. M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985 (2009).

The Matter of Memory  69 Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1998. ———. Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Riga: Hartknoch, 1781. ———. Kritik der reinen Vernunft. 2nd ed. Riga: Hartknoch, 1787. Locke, John. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Ed. Peter H. Nidditch. The Clarendon Edition of the Works of John Locke. Oxford, et al.: Clarendon, 1975. Lynch, David and Mark Frost, creators. Twin Peaks. Lynch/Frost Productions, 1990–91. Netflix, https://www.netflix.com/watch/70174187. Paxton, Amanda. “Romantic Flashbacks: Coleridge, De Quincey, and Duration.” European Romantic Review 26.5 (2015): 659–77. Sütterlin, Nicole. “E.T.A. Hoffmann and the Development of Trauma.” Essays in Romanticism 24.1 (2017): 83–104. Wordsworth, William. Wordsworth’s Poetry and Prose. Ed. Nicholas Halmi. New York: Norton, 2014.

3 Memory, Fact, and Fiction Imaginative Biographical Representation in the Novels of E.T.A. Hoffmann Christopher R. Clason

When the material that takes the autobiographical or biographical form is fictitious, another layer of doubt invades the space between the reader’s suspension of disbelief and the text. Yet, if the fictional representation of life is to succeed aesthetically, it must resemble reality sufficiently to enable the reader to suspend disbelief: otherwise, the novel falls into another category of literature, for example, that of the Märchen, which, as a “fantastic” genre, produces a far different reading experience. Although biographers or autobiographers may indeed have embellished the “facts” of the lives they present, the described actions, events, thoughts, etc., must at least seem possible in order to lay claim to the reader’s attention and pleasure in the text. The uncertainty, skepticism, and doubt in the reader’s mind is exacerbated, however, by both the form and content of both Hoffmann novels, Die Elixiere des Teufels1 and Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr.2 As has been suggested by numerous critics,3 these works fall immediately into a sustained chaos due to the confusion, subjectivity, and probable insanity of the main narrator in the earlier novel, and the incompetence and negligence of the fictional editors, especially in the Kater Murr text4; in both cases these features function as authorially constructed properties of the fictions. Yet, in both novels the narrators take pains to present the material, regardless of how marvelous/miraculous it may appear,5 as truthful and factual and to convince the reader not to dismiss it out-of-hand as untrue. Mistakes, exaggerations, and distortions become commonplace, while the fictional editors must beg the readers’ indulgence again and again. However, by its very nature as writing about one’s own life, the autobiographical text is both subjective and objective, imaginative and factual. The propensity of life writing to narrate a tale representing one’s own reality clearly depends upon the reliability of an author’s memory of the facts, events, and persons, as well as their imaginative prowess for weaving together a narrative that is interesting as well as verisimilar. By the early nineteenth century, facticity in autobiography had already DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-5

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  71 become a significant topic of discussion,6 which was thematized in the very title of perhaps the most significant German autobiography of the time, Goethe’s Aus meinem Leben: Dichtung und Wahrheit (From My Life: Poetry and Truth).7 Goethe himself spoke of it as a “Lebensmärchen,” (“fairy tale of a life”) even as he was composing it.8 Perhaps more than in any other genre of literature, autobiography must perform a balancing act, and work through the complex relationship between imagination and memory in a manner that entertains the reader while not violating the reader’s suspension of disbelief. How Hoffmann treats the dynamics of memory and imagination as a theme in his two novels will provide the focus of this essay. The issues surrounding the question of whether the material presented in biographical writing is actually anchored in reality becomes most complicated in a work of fiction and extends far beyond one’s trust that an author is telling the truth. Of course, many of the actions the author Hoffmann describes may have been performed by him or happened to him personally, or he may have witnessed historical events which he chooses to describe in the context of the novels. While investigating this question may provide many interesting insights into the life of the author (such as have been proposed for the Kater Murr satire on contemporary political fraternities in the Katzburschenschaft scene, or the parody of Berlin salon life in the episode at the Hundegesellschaft), it is beyond the scope of this essay to do so. Instead, I hope to examine Hoffmann’s treatment of memory as perhaps the most problematic aspect of the life writing genre, since the believability of the narrator (and the capacity of a reader to suspend disbelief and enjoy the experience of reading the novel) rests upon the most fragile of evidence that one can consider the events authentic, or all the more so, likely, even on the fictional level. The dynamic relationship between imagination and memory and the profusion of mistakes and distortions in the texts make extraordinary demands on the reader.

3.1 Memory and Imagination Two hundred years after the publication of these novels, however, we are beginning to forge a technical understanding of memory which further problematizes the relationship of Dichtung and Wahrheit in autobiography. As Alan Richardson has pointed out, modern science’s grasp of brain physiology reveals a strong cognitive psychological basis for the relationship of imagination and memory.9 Recent neuropsychological research “suggests that remembering the past and imagining the future may in fact be closely related functions of a single cognitive system, or at the very least, kindred functions that overlap significantly and share many of the same neural mechanisms” (277). Studies involving MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) and PET (positron emission tomography) scans have identified

72  Christopher R. Clason overlapping sites within the brain where both memory and imaginative functions operate, giving rise to the “Janus hypothesis,” which suggests that the brain employs very similar processes when reconstructing personal memory or imagining future events, both acts of a kind of “mental time travel” in opposite temporal directions (Richardson 279–80). Perhaps most significant for autobiographical writing is episodic memory, especially for relating personal history from the narrator’s perspective. Richardson, quoting Schacter et al.,10 indicates how such memory, which often possesses an abundance of interesting and specific detail, may also evince some structural flaws: Episodic memories, which tend to reflect personal experience rather than general knowledge or implicit skills and feature phenomenologically rich, detailed, and specific scenarios, are also known for their “fragmentary and fragile” character and have been widely seen as “unreliable and subject to distortion.” As Schacter explains, episodic memory is “reconstructive” rather than “reproductive,” involving a “constructive process of putting together bits and pieces of information” rather than storing “exact replicas of past experience” such as a mechanical recording device might provide. Episodic memories need to be maintained, refreshed, and periodically re-created in the mind and— if they avoid fading away altogether in the process—they can lose key details, become fused with thematically related or temporally adjacent memories, suffer distortion via suggestion or new biases introduced at the time of retrieval, or otherwise erode in any number of ways. If its function were solely to recapture the personal past as reliably as possible, episodic memory would look flawed to say the least. (Richardson 280) Episodic memory, which produces personal reminiscences that inform biographical writing, thus obtains the characteristics of imaginative fiction, even in cases where the author claims to be telling “the whole truth and nothing but the truth.” However, while such memory may seem flawed, it is essential as part of human language’s expression of subjectively perceived reality. Indeed, as Richardson’s analysis indicates, distortion occurs when the memory of even a part of one incident is recalled, combined with other memories, and contextualized, in order to produce a narrative that is both coherent and cohesive. Thus, memory’s close physiological relationship with the imagination aligns it structurally with fiction, employing embellishment and distortion as narrative techniques to relate personally experienced incidents from an interesting perspective. The physiologically conditioned imaginativeness of personal memory and the subjectivity of authorial perspective place life writing in a unique category of literature, characterized by eyewitness factuality and subjective deformation.11

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  73

3.2  Die Elixiere des Teufels: Autobiography and Confession Generically a Gothic novel, Die Elixiere des Teufels depends on atmosphere and narrative perspective to augment the reader’s pleasure through terror and surprise. At the same time, it traces the personal development of the monk, Medardus, from his birth until his death, in the manner of the Bildungsroman. On the fictional level, the authoring of this autobiography clearly has practical, therapeutic, and salvational aspects. Medardus’ prior, Leonardus, assigns him the task of recalling and recording the details of his life, in the hopes that it will turn him from the wanton path he has been walking. He has committed numerous evil acts, including murder and rape, and until now even his most extreme penitential exercises have had little positive effect. Furthermore, his inner conflicts have led him to one psychological crisis after another, including loss of identity, the experience of his Doppelgänger, numerous breakdowns, etc. The writing assignment, somewhat akin to a depth-psychology regression, is apparently intended to engage his memory and force his self-confrontation, ultimately leading to the realization of his sinful acts, the admission of his guilt, and therefore the opportunity to express his contrition. The fictional editor’s preface serves a critical function as a framing device for the bizarre text it introduces. Following Gothic tradition, the editor claims to have recovered Medardus’ manuscript from the current prior of the Capuchin monastery at B., who suggested that the autobiography contains its own sort of evil and should perhaps be burned rather than read. But, as one might expect, the editor hopes that the “well-disposed” reader might not reject the text, but rather, in their mind (i.e., through the reader’s imagination, which the novel has stimulated), travel on Medardus’ life’s journey with him: Entschließest du dich aber, mit dem Medardus, als seist du sein treuer Gefährte, durch finstre Kreuzgänge und Zellen—durch die bunte— bunteste Welt zu ziehen, und mit ihm das Schauerliche, Entsetzliche, Tolle, Possenhafte seines Lebens zu ertragen, so wirst du dich vielleicht an den mannigfachen Bildern der Camera obscura, die sich dir aufgetan, ergötzen.–Es kann auch kommen, daß das gestaltlos­ scheinende, so wie du schärfer es ins Auge fassest, sich dir bald deut­ lich und rund darstellt. (DKV 2/2, 12) But if you decide to accompany Medardus through gloomy cloisters and cells, through the lurid episodes of his passage through the world, and to bear the horror, the fear, the madness, the ludicrous perversity of his life as if you were his faithful companion—then maybe you will derive some pleasure from those glimpses of a camera obscura

74  Christopher R. Clason which have been vouchsafed to you. It may even be that, as you look more closely, what seemed formless will become clear and precise.12 (Elixirs 4) The reference here to the optical instrument, the camera obscura, presents an invitation from the editor to the reader to employ her or his imagination, in order to immerse oneself in the text and to participate in the quest with Medardus. The instrument facilitates the use of the imagination since the image it renders is not the actual object but merely its counterfeit image. Furthermore, the camera obscura inverts and often distorts the original image. Thus, it provides us with a most appropriate metaphor for the operation of the imagination on reality, transmitting the surface appearance of a concrete object, transforming it, and rendering a “false” image, but also contextualizing the object and the viewing subject. But what is that object which “seemed formless?” Is the “Gestaltlosscheinende” not precisely those objects, activities, and events that Medardus described from his own memory, transforming them into his autobiography? Indeed, the de-contextualized, fragmentary memories recalled by the monk are embedded within the narrative that the reader is about to read. The novel, serving as a kind of textual camera obscura, manipulates the images, assembling them via the imagination into a narrative and rendering a text that is not the experience of the past itself, but an impression of it; thus, the “sharpening” of an image may correspond to the revelation of truth on the higher plane of narrative art, bringing Medardus salvation via his writing. Hoffmann’s fictional narrator concludes this paragraph with a botanical metaphor which, at first glance, seems disconnected from what has come before. Addressing the reader, the narrator suggests, “Du erkennst den verborgenen Keim, den ein dunkles Verhängnis gebar, und der, zur üppigen Pflanze emporgeschossen, fort und fort wuchert in tausend Ranken, bis eine Blüte, zur Frucht reifend, allen Lebenssaft an sich zieht, und den Keim selber tötet” (DKV 2/2, 12; “you will come to recognize the hidden seed which, born of a secret union, grows into a luxurious plant and spreads forth in a thousand tendrils, until a single blossom, swelling to maturity, absorbs all the life-sap and kills the seed itself” [Elixirs 4]). The transition from camera obscura to the plant is precipitous, and it is not immediately clear to what the botanical image refers. However, the connections may become evident if we consider this metaphor with respect to the dynamic relationship between memory and imagination. In this scenario, the seed represents memory serving as the origin of the narrative and providing the elementary content of the biography; the plant that it spawns therefore represents the story itself, transformed from memory to contextualized events, persons, and objects and crafted into a coherent and cohesive text. Working on the raw materials of the memory, the imagination weaves a beautiful tale, like the luxurious

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  75 plant’s single blossom; but as beautiful as it may be, it has nevertheless transformed the original, remembered items, perhaps so much so that the elements of the tale no longer reflect accurately the authentic past events and actions, once contained in memory, that have informed them—in fact, the distinct likelihood arises that the altered version of events in the narrative now replaces the original memories, and thus metaphorically “kills the seed itself.” The substance of the memory, as well as its veracity, is thus threatened by its imaginative transformation into art. Furthermore, so the editor complains, the monk’s handwriting is so terse, minute, and shaky that the text is practically impossible to read. Thus, from the very beginning, the record of Medardus’ memory of his life is in grave danger, not only from outside the text (with respect to the prior’s assertion that it should be destroyed), but from within the text as well, through the transformation of memory into fiction and the illegibility of the manuscript (i.e., the concrete appearance of the text—an issue that will resurface later with a vengeance in Kater Murr). The novel proper begins with an account of Franz’s (so Medardus had been christened) background and earliest recollections, which are scarcely recollections at all, but rather the appropriations of his mother’s memories. With respect to the history of his father’s life and demise, he exclaims: “Die Erzählungen meiner Mutter … sind so in mein Innres gedrungen, daß ich Alles selbst gesehen, selbst erfahren zu haben glaube, unerachtet es unmöglich ist, daß meine Erinnerungen so weit hinausreicht” (DKV 2/2, 16; “The stories which my mother told me … have so entered into my mind that I seem to have seen and experienced everything myself. Yet my memory cannot possibly reach back so far” [Elixirs 6]). And further, in remembering an old pilgrim who once brought him a companion to play with, he admits: “unerachtet ich gewiß glaube, daß nur aus der Beschreibung meiner Mutter sich im Innern sein lebhaftes Bild erzeugt hat” (DKV 2/2, 16; “Yet I am sure that the vivid impression I have of him only springs from my mother’s description” [Elixirs 8]). He remains less than certain about his memories for quite some time; for example, when describing a visit in his early youth to a Cistercian convent to meet the abbess, he claims that his memory becomes clearer. Nevertheless, he acknowledges that, although he knew about the encounter with the old pilgrim “aus eigner Anschauung” (“from my own experience”),13 he still needs his mother to complete the anecdote regarding the old pilgrim’s actual words. Finally, Franz makes a remarkable admission: “Die Zeit von jener Begebenheit mit dem alten Pilger … bis zu dem Moment, als mich meine Mutter zum erstenmal zur Äbtissin brachte, macht eine völlige Lücke: nicht die leiseste Ahnung ist mir davon übrig geblieben” (DKV 2/2, 17–18; “From the time of that encounter with the old pilgrim, to the moment when my mother first took me to the Abbess, I have not the slightest memory” [Elixirs 8]). Medardus’ childhood memories thus arise not only from his own experience (the episode of the pilgrim and his

76  Christopher R. Clason playmate) but also from the stories his mother told him, which supply especially the narrative coherence of his childhood; in other words, he recalls individual events from unclear impressions left by personal experiences that have been woven together via the stories narrated by his mother, and thus are based on secondhand information and subject to another’s subjective perspective, which the boy internalizes into his own “reality.” The visit with the abbess is one of the most significant events in his early life, not only because the abbess, his father’s former lover, will become a figure of great importance for Franz, but also because when she first embraces him, she does so somewhat overzealously, and she imprints onto his shoulder a tattoo-like impression of the diamond cross she wears around her neck, which she accidentally presses hard against the young boy’s skin. As a result, he will carry this mark as an identifying brand throughout his entire life.14 Immediately thereafter, Franz, having been comforted by his mother and fed by the nuns, begins narrating stories of the saints’ lives, images of which he found on the church walls. He explains to his astonished mother and the abbess that his hagiographic knowledge has been provided by the young companion whom the old pilgrim had brought to play with him. Thus, Hoffmann introduces the reader to two variations on the theme of “remembering through appropriation.” In the earlier examples, the author cannot differentiate between his memories and those of his mother, and thus while writing down his autobiographical text, he incorporates her narrative into his own. His process for recalling the hagiographic stories represented in the monastery art and architecture mirror this technique, for it has by now become evident that he has internalized the life stories of other entities as well: Franz merely borrows tales that someone has told him, incorporating them into his own memory and narrating them, as if they were his own inventions, to his “astonished” audience. Indeed, it seems likely that he is engaged in an epistemological process of self-identification and memory through his internalization of hagiographic stories. For example, when later during a Sunday sermon Medardus exclaims “ich bin der Heilige Antonius” (DKV 2/2, 42; “I am St. Anthony!” [Elixiere 28]), or when he first encounters the object of his sexual obsession, Aurelie, in the church before the portrait of St. Rosalie (DKV 2/2, 51–52; Elixiere 35–36), and equates the two in his mind, it becomes possible, even likely, that he has somewhere heard the tales of these saints’ lives and the monk merely incorporated them as memory. Later, their biographies render the raw materials from which he builds parts of the imaginative narrative of his own autobiography. There are several substantial texts that other characters have composed, either orally or in writing, which Medardus quotes verbatim as part of his autobiography and which provide a great deal of expository information as well as plot content. Examples of these include: 1) the

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  77 comments of the Prince’s personal physician, who narrates a large portion of Part 4 (DKV 2/2, 162–82 [Elixirs 124–40]); 2) the letter Aurelie composes to her friend and benefactress, the Abbess (DKV 2/2, 237–47 [Elixirs 182–90]); 3) numerous dialogues wherein the eccentric Peter Schönfeld (a.k.a. Pietro Belcampo) breaks into the text with his obscure, and yet wise and insightful, communications and explains to Medardus certain connections between events, people, and objects that he needs to know; and 4) the text extracted from the Old Painter’s strange book, which narrates the essential facts of Medardus’ family history and begins to tie up the numerous loose ends that Medardus’ even stranger narrative has undone (DKV 2/2, 277–97 [Elixirs 214–29]). The last pages of his autobiography, describing his final moments of life, are recorded by one of his monastic colleagues, the librarian Pater Spiridion (DKV 2/2, 350– 52 [Elixirs 273–75]). These textual fragments serve Medardus as he pens his autobiography in two respects. First, they are presented as eyewitness accounts, and so they are prone to subjective distortions, as well as a limited perspective— and therefore no single author of these texts (except perhaps the spectral figure of the Old Painter) can piece together enough information to unmask Medardus and counter his many untruths. However, taken together, they provide factual corroboration for many of the deeds and events Medardus describes—and so they verify, for the reader’s benefit, the factuality of some events and entities that seem to have arisen from the monk’s delusional mind, such as his Doppelgänger or the identity of the image in the painting in the monastic church of St. Rosalie and the object of his lustful desire, Aurelie. Second, the fragments stimulate and focus parts of Medardus’ memory. Only Medardus can claim general knowledge of his story in its entirety, but his writing becomes more detailed through his deployment of the inserted texts. He (and the reader) can thereby make sense of some of the more fantastic episodes of the tale, explain the background history of his lineage and the curse on his family, and provide context and contrasting perspectives on some of his deeds. Numerous critics have cited Medardus as a prime example of a dissociated consciousness, a condition which afflicts many characters in Hoffmann’s works to some degree.15 Perhaps a key to understanding Medardus’ identity crises may be to consider them parallel to memory, i.e., that his childhood appropriation of others’ memories undermines the later development of healthy identity formation, and therefore he can easily shift his psychological “shape” (e.g., by taking on the murderous personality of his half-brother Viktorin or the ever-shifting character of his bi-polar shadow Peter Schönfeld/Pietro Belcampo). He even claims that a foreign “voice” resides within him, which, when Medardus feels threatened in some way, breaks in, takes over his physical voice, and saves him. Thus, the act of writing his autobiography becomes an attempt to bring these aberrant, dissimilar strands together under Medardus’ own

78  Christopher R. Clason authority of authorship. Taking charge of the eclectic ingredients of his life history—consisting, quilt-like, of patches and swaths of material which others have randomly contributed—he can weave his personal version of what he has done and experienced. If Medardus can be said to have undergone a Bildung, then it is a composite formation: by the end of the novel, he (and the reader) must realize that his life has essentially not been his own—that external agents have provided him narrative fragments of identity he has merely incorporated as his own experience. His “salvation” consists, therefore, of his becoming aware of this fact through the “con-textualizing” of the many, strange components of his story, thereby taking possession of the whole of his life and so accepting responsibility for what he has done. Finally, it is of little importance whether Medardus’ text reports verifiable facts; rather, it is essential that it represents his perspective, creating a singular identity for himself, which enables him to survey his life and to atone for his sins. Of course, on its most basic level, the story of Medardus is a fiction told by the author Hoffmann; but in an important sense, the text is also a fiction on the “reality” level of the novel, a product of the monk’s imagination, which has cemented many narrative components to build the tale of Medardus’ fall and ultimate salvation.

3.3  Die Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr: Life Writing and Textual Memory Hoffmann’s final novel, Kater Murr, is also largely (if not primarily) concerned with life writing and Bildung. The bizarre, fictional narrative of the novel’s publication reveals that it is the result of blunders at every stage of its production. The editor’s introduction points out that to facilitate his writing, the feline autobiographer stole parts of another manuscript, literally ripping it apart and inserting pages randomly in his own text to serve as padding and blotting paper. It is printed in this condition, with no human intervention or rectification. This leads to the chaotic external form of the text, a “zusammengewürfeltes Durcheinander” (DKV 5, 11; “oddly assorted hotchpotch,” [Tomcat Murr 3])16 in the words of the editor, out of which comes an implicit challenge to the reader to make sense of two lives: that of the cat as well as that of a Kapellmeister, Johannes Kreisler, an artist of no small talent but plagued by an acute awareness of his mental instability, his lack of social skills, and the “circular” path of his life, which is even suggested by his name, “Kreisler” (in German, a “Kreis” is a circle).17 While the cat’s autobiography apparently proceeds linearly, it is ruptured periodically by the insertion of random biographical fragments that report Kreisler’s life. Further complications arise when the reader comes to the realization that the Kreisler fragments are not chronological, but rather report

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  79 events in a somewhat reverse order, although one can scarcely ascertain more than a handful of useful temporal relationships to orient oneself within it. However, there is at least one chronological feature that connects the autobiography with the Kreisler plot: the final Murr fragment of the novel seems to correspond to a point in time occurring immediately before the action of the very first Kreisler fragment, implying a kind of temporal and structural circularity in the two plot strands, and indicating a return to the beginning at the end of the second and final volume. The tomcat, like Medardus in Elixiere, records memories of events from a very early time in his life up to the narrative present, employing a first-person, consciously autobiographical perspective, and clearly intending to produce a cohesive and linear life-narrative for an implied feline reader. The reader’s trust in Murr’s remembering, however, is constantly compromised, primarily because self-promotion trumps accurate reporting of the facts. Thus, the actions and sentiments he recalls are colored by his paeans to himself as the epitome of “catness,” and as a superlatively erudite feline intellectual in the eighteenth-century tradition of Bildung. Murr’s memoirs may indeed relate some events that did, in fact, occur (this is demonstrated where the autobiography and biography both report the same event similarly, where Abraham finds the kitten Murr and brings him home, as I discuss below). However, their excessively subjective character makes much of the text difficult to believe at best, and at worst condemns his “Ansichten” as outright deceptions and fabrications. Indeed, Murr’s text bears the mark of a powerful imagination, particularly in two respects: 1) his accomplishments and aspirations acquire an unjustifiably, almost mythically excellent, quality, particularly when he celebrates his ordinary, instinctive behaviors and even his artistic failures with superlatives of high praise (e.g., “Beinahe hätte ich schon damals ein Heldengedicht gemacht, … doch als ich fertig, war es etwas anderes worden, wofür Taßo und Ariost noch im Grabe dem Himmel danken können. Sprang wirklich ein Heldengedicht unter meinen Klauen hervor, beide hätte kein Mensch mehr gelesen” (DKV 5, 44; “At this period I almost composed a heroic epic … but the finished product turned out to be not quite in that line, and Tasso and Ariosto may thank Heaven for it from their graves. For if my paws actually had penned an epic, no one would ever have read either of them any more” [Tomcat Murr 27]) and 2) Murr’s “imaginative” misappropriation of quotations from numerous sources, such that his misuses sometimes ingeniously satirize the source from which he draws his material (especially Goethe).18 I will explore other ramifications of textual borrowing, misquoting, and purloining later in this essay, for they incorporate another kind of memory that constructs a life in a somewhat parallel manner to the autobiography penned by Medardus in Hoffmann’s earlier novel.

80  Christopher R. Clason In the Kreisler fragments, the biographer does not self-congratulate, but instead laments the difficulties inherent in his task: he describes in detail the challenges he faces in objectively piecing together Kreisler’s biography, especially due to the Kapellmeister’s erratic mood swings and difficult personality, as well as the lack of objective documentation of any kind to verify the memories of those who contribute to it. In Part I, the biographer begins the third Kreisler fragment with the lamentation that there is: nichts verdrießlicher für einen Historiographen oder einen Biographen, als wenn er, wie auf einen wilden Füllen reitend hin und her sprengen muß, über Stock und Stein, über Acker und Wiesen, immer nach gebahnten Wegen trachtend, niemals sie erreichend. So geht es dem, der es unternommen für dich, geliebter Leser, das aufzuschreiben, was er von dem wunderlichen Leben des Kapellmeisters Johannes Kreisler erfahren … Aber [eine] … chronologische Ordnung kann gar nicht aufkommen, da dem unglücklichen Erzähler nur mündlich, Brockenweis mitgeteilte Nachrichten zu Gebote stehen, die er, um nicht das Ganze aus dem Gedächtnisse zu verlieren, sogleich verarbeiten muß. Wie es eigentlich mit der Mitteilung dieser Nachrichten herging, sollst du, sehr lieber Leser! noch vor dem Schlusse des Buchs erfahren, und dann wirst du vielleicht das rhapsodische Wesen des Ganzen entschuldigen, vielleicht aber auch meinen, daß trotz des Anscheins der Abgerissenheit, doch ein fester durchlaufender Faden alle Teile zusammen halte. (DKV 5, 58) nothing more tiresome for a historian or a biographer than when, as if riding a wild colt, he must cavort this way and that, over sticks and stones, uphill and down dale, always searching for trodden paths and never finding them. Such is the case of the man who has undertaken to set down for your benefit, gentle reader, what he knows of the remarkable life of Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler … [a] nice chronological order is out of the question, since the unfortunate narrator has at his disposal nothing but oral information imparted bit by bit, which he must set down at once if the whole is not to be lost from his memory. As for just how this information was imparted, gentle reader, that is something you shall learn before the end of the book, when perhaps you will forgive the rhapsodic nature of the whole, and you may perhaps think that, despite its apparent incoherence, it has a firm thread running through it, holding all the parts together. (Tomcat Murr 37) We never find out, however, how the biographer acquired the information which they are imparting to us; one assumes that the information may have been contained in the parts of the book Murr did not employ

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  81 as blotting and padding paper. Thus, the biographer hints that their text is far more jumbled and confused than one may have expected; however, the reader discovers that the collection of narrated bits of memory proves to be far more cohesive than promised. Over the course of the Kreisler biography, one discovers a wealth of facts and information that, surprisingly, provides a plot line that holds together well, considering its apparently fractured and haphazardly assembled structure. Each fragment is sufficiently long and detailed to provide essentially intact scenes and relatively complete conversations. However, the author Hoffmann maintains the fragmentary structure of the Kreisler biography, concluding most fragments with a textual “tease” that something very significant is about to be narrated and then interposing the Murr fragment, but only rarely reacquiring the line of thought, the plot thread, or the conversational chain that has just concluded. Indeed, we may surmise that he does so in order to protect the mystery surrounding his Kapellmeister, Johannes Kreisler—one may even claim that the Kreisler plot in Kater Murr “remembers” the text of the Kreisleriana, published several years earlier in the Fantasiestücke in Callots Manier, where the fictional author, “der reisende Enthusiast,” introduces Kreisler through a series of questions to which there are simply no known answers: “Wo ist er her? Niemand weiß es! Wer waren seine Eltern? Es ist unbekannt! Wessen Schüler ist er? Eines guten Meisters, denn er spielt vortrefflich …” (“Where is he from? Not a soul knows! Who were his parents? It is a mystery! Who taught him to play music? A good master, since he plays excellently …”).19 Of course, other problems arise when the memory seems to function too well. Most of the Kreisler fragments consist of extensive quotations of verbal exchanges among the characters. In detailed descriptions of other incidents and conversations, the reader finds themself questioning the facticity, even probability, of recalled exchanges, especially where the biographer reports entire conversations verbatim, when they previously complained about the weakness of their memory.20 Nevertheless, some corroborating evidence does exist, but one must draw this from the feline autobiography, which also seems unreliable at best. Perhaps the clearest example of such verification involves the reporting of Meister Abraham’s rescue of Murr, which the cat recounts in his first fragment: Ganz dunkel erinnere ich mich gewisser knurrender prustender Töne die um mich her erklangen und die ich beinahe wider meinen Willen hervorbringe, wenn mich der Zorn überwältigt. Deutlicher und beinahe mit vollem Bewußtsein finde ich mich in einem sehr engen Behältnis mit weichen Wänden eingeschlossen, kaum fähig Atem zu schöpfen und in Not und Angst ein klägliches Jammergeschrei erhebend. Ich fühle, daß etwas in das Behältnis hinabgriff und mich sehr unsanft beim Leibe packte und dies gab mir Gelegenheit, die erste

82  Christopher R. Clason wunderbare Kraft, womit mich die Natur begabt, zu fühlen und zu üben. Aus meinen weichen überpelzten Vorderpfoten schnellte ich spitze gelenkige Krallen hervor und grub sie ein in das Ding das mich gepackt und das, wie ich später gelernt, nichts anders sein konnte, als eine menschliche Hand. Diese Hand zog mich aber heraus aus dem Behältnis, und warf mich hin und gleich darauf fühlte ich zwei heftige Schläge auf den beiden Seiten des Gesichts über die jetzt ein, wie ich wohl sagen mag, stattlicher Bart herüberragt. Die Hand teilte mir, wie ich jetzt beurteilen kann, von jenem Muskelspiel der Pfoten verletzt, ein paar Ohrfeigen zu … Bald darauf erfaßte sie mich aber aufs neue beim Kopf und drückte ihn nieder, so daß ich mit dem Mäulchen in eine Flüssigkeit geriet, die ich … aufzulecken begann, welches mir eine seltsame innere Behaglichkeit erregte. Es war wie ich jetzt weiß, süße Milch. (DKV 5, 20–21) I have a very dim recollection of certain growling, hissing sounds going on around me, sounds I make myself, almost involuntarily, when overcome by anger. More clearly and almost with full awareness, I remember finding myself imprisoned in a very cramped container with soft walls, scarcely able to draw breath, and setting up a miserable lamentation in my need and fear. I felt something reach down into the container and take hold of my body very ungently, which gave me an opportunity of sensing and employing the first wonderful power that Nature has bestowed on me. I shot the sharp, supple claws out from my well-furred forepaws and dug them into the thing which had seized me, and which, as I learned later, could be nothing but a human hand. The hand, however, removed me from the container and dropped me, and next moment I felt two violent blows on both sides of the face which today, though I say it myself, is dominated by a fine set of whiskers. I now realize that the hand, injured by the muscular play of my paws, boxed my ears a couple of times … Soon thereafter, however, it took hold of my head once more and pushed it down, so that my little mouth touched a liquid which I began to lap … [It] gave me a curiously comfortable feeling inside. I know now that it was sweet milk. (Tomcat Murr 10) Murr’s version of the tale is remarkably detailed, which is surprising. The images are acoustic and tactile, but not visual; these must be his first memories, and, as the cat himself points out, he cannot see, since newborn cats’ eyes are shut for a number of days. Yet, he is nevertheless capable of recalling the texture of his “container,” as well as his angry mood and the sensation of first extending his claws and then scratching with them, as well as the sound he makes. The disembodied hand Murr

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  83 describes in his version of the event must belong to Meister Abraham, since it is he who brings Murr home in his pocket and then cares for him. In the first Makulaturblatt fragment of the Kreisler biography, Abraham relates the event from his memory: Ich … griff, nicht ohne Gefahr, herab, faßte das wimmernde Kätzchen, zog es hinauf und steckte es in die Tasche. Nach Hause gekommen, zog ich mich schnell aus, und warf mich ermüdet und erschöpft wie ich war, aufs Bett. Kaum war ich aber eingeschlafen, als mich ein klägliches Piepen und Winseln weckte, das aus meinem Kleiderschrank herzukommen schien.—Ich hatte das Kätzchen vergessen und es in der Rocktasche gelassen. Ich befreite das Tier aus dem Gefängnis, wofür es mich dermaßen kratzte, daß mir alle fünf Finger bluteten. Schon war ich im Begriff den Kater durchs Fenster zu werfen, ich besann mich aber und schämte mich meiner kleinlichen Torheit, meiner Rachsucht, die nicht einmal bei Menschen angebracht ist, viel weniger bei der unvernünftigen Kreatur.—Genug, ich zog mit aller Mühe und Sorgfalt den Kater groß. (DKV 5, 35) I … reached down, not without some danger, got hold of the whimpering kitten, picked him up and put him in my pocket. Once home, I quickly undressed and fell on my bed, tired and exhausted as I was. However, I had scarcely fallen asleep when I was woken by a pitiful squealing and crying. It seemed to be coming from my wardrobe. I had forgotten the kitten, and had left him in my coat pocket. I released the animal from his prison, and in return he scratched me hard enough to draw blood from all five fingers. I was about to fling the tom kitten out of the window, but recollected myself and was ashamed of my petty foolishness, my vengefulness, unfitting to be shown even towards humans, let alone the unreasoning brute creation. In short, I reared the tomcat with loving care. (Tomcat Murr 21) The reader notices immediately that Abraham’s account differs from Murr’s in some details, although on the main points their stories seem to agree. Murr recalls an ear-boxing; however, Abraham, whose conscience is already burdened with the very thought of doing harm to the cat in this episode, instead remembers that he “was about to” punish the small kitten but did not: thus, it is possible that Abraham has imaginatively constructed a recollection in which he does not inflict pain on the tiny creature. On the other hand, Murr’s imagination may have constructed his memory of the event. At home, in Abraham’s library or under his oven, Murr spends much of his time listening and observing, and it is possible that he has overheard Abraham narrating the story of his

84  Christopher R. Clason rescue—perhaps he overheard Abraham conversing with Kreisler in the first Makulaturblatt fragment and made the memory his own. Murr would not be the first of Hoffmann’s characters to internalize the narrations of others and present them later as if they were remembered testimonies of factual experiences, as we have seen in the case of Brother Medardus. A second type of memory informing literary works, and one that is especially relevant in Hoffmann’s satirical and parodistic writing, is “textual memory,” specifically referring to how Hoffmann’s texts receive and quote from previous literary works, through intertextuality and legitimate quotation on the one hand, and as plagiarism and outright theft on another. Much critical attention has been paid to literary quotation in Kater Murr, especially in regard to how Murr “appropriates” (i.e., “plagiarizes”) earlier texts.21 Here, however, it is useful to consider the novel’s treatment of earlier literary works as a manner of calling forth memories; their subjective use and accuracy provide still further commentary on the effectiveness of memory as a source of information in composing (auto-) biographical writing. Murr purloins a number of familiar literary quotations from a broad number of sources such as Goethe, Shakespeare, and others, in order to embellish his writing. His thefts are so abundant that the fictional editor of the volume must break into the text in five separate loci and reproach Murr for pilfering passages from various works without giving credit to the sources. In the last editorial interruption, however, the reader is treated to an example of plagiarism that raises the editor’s (and most certainly the reader’s) eyebrows. Most surprisingly, Murr maintains that a poet or philosopher [sollte] auch die sogennante höhere gesellschaftliche Kultur, die auf nichts anders hinausläuft als auf das Bemühen, alle Ecken, Spitzen wegzuhobeln, alle Phisiognomien zu einer einzigen zu gestalten die eben deshalb aufhört eine zu sein, nicht zu hoch anschlagen. (DKV 5, 428) [should] not set too high a value … on the so-called refinement of high society, which amounts only to an attempt to smooth away all corners and sharp edges, reducing all physiognomies to a single one, which then ceases to be one for that very reason. (Tomcat Murr 302–03) At which point the editor interrupts the cat’s text and laments: Murr, es tut mir leid, daß du dich so oft mit fremden Federn schmückst. Du wirst, wie ich mit Recht befürchten muß, dadurch bei den geneigten Lesern merklich verlieren.—Kommen alle diese

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  85 Betrachtungen mit denen du dich so brüstest nicht gerade hin aus dem Munde des Kapellmeisters Johannes Kreisler und ist es überhaupt möglich, daß du solche Lebensweisheit sammeln konntest, um eines menschlichen Schriftstellers Gemüt, das wunderlichste Ding auf Erden, so tief zu durchschauen! (DKV 5, 428–29) Murr, I am sorry to see you decking yourself out in borrowed plumes so often. I have good reason to fear that it will lower you considerably in the esteem of our gentle readers. Don’t all these reflections you’re so proud of come straight from the mouth of Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler? And anyway, how could you acquire sufficient experience of life to see so deeply into the mind of a human writer, the most wonderful thing on earth? (Tomcat Murr 303) How is it that Murr has suddenly transformed from a fawning, philistine creature of comfort into a rebellious spirit and a champion of individuality like Kreisler? Could it be that Meister Abraham’s desire to lodge Murr with Kreisler has the desired effect: that each will become more like the other, in other words, that Kreisler will become more flexible and amiable in social situations, and that Murr will gain some artistic integrity and genuine, legitimate insights into artistic production, thereby seeking more profound artistic material than merely his two favorite subjects: eating and comfort? Indeed, if we place these two incidents side-by-side, the strong possibility presents itself that Murr has appropriated the life experiences about which he writes in much the same manner as Medardus. While listening to Meister Abraham’s stories about him, the cat hears the story of his discovery and rescue, internalizes the main thread of the narrative, imaginatively embellishes it, and from it composes his memoirs. Murr learns how to read books and soaks up the quotations, much like the blotting paper he has misappropriated from the Kreisler biographical manuscript soaks up the wet ink from the manuscript of his life story, and vice-versa. As he co-opts the tale, Murr again adapts the elements of what he learns and crafts his own narrative. From these sources come not only the ingredients of his writing, but Murr’s identity and memory as well. Will Murr shed his philistine ways and embrace the path of the true artist? Will he produce works of high aesthetic quality? We cannot answer these questions with certainty, for the promised third volume of the novel was never written, and so we cannot know what occurs in the timespan between the end of Murr’s final autobiographical fragment and his untimely death. However, if one keeps in mind that the tomcat-author is primarily responsible (according to the editor’s fictional foreword) for the topsy-turvy structure of the novel, a feature which marks the work as

86  Christopher R. Clason one of the most sophisticated and forward-looking Romane of the early nineteenth century, then one has to admire how far Murr has already come toward achieving authentic artistic goals.

3.4 Conclusion: Memory and Imagination, Liquids and Romantic (Auto)Biography Both of Hoffmann’s novels relate life stories of extraordinary characters. Die Elixiere des Teufels describes the pleasures and torments of the monk Medardus from his earliest childhood until his death, and he composes it as a penitential text through which he ultimately achieves salvation. Kater Murr purports to portray the life of a self-promoting, self-aggrandizing, but nevertheless extraordinary tomcat, and by a sheer stroke of luck it also furnishes us with fragments of a composer’s biography, that of a Romantic artist whose life still remains a mystery in many ways, because of its fragmentary and unchronological narrative, a true “zusammengewürfeltes Durcheinander” (DKV 5, 11; Tomcat Murr 3), as the fictional editor describes it. Perhaps the most significant common feature of the two novels lies in how Hoffmann’s characters remember, and how their memories are channeled into their life writing. The Capuchin monk Medardus suffers from a shattered, fragmented identity, and he gathers memories from stories that other characters tell him. His mother provides him information about his earliest days, when his name was Franz, and after having heard the narrative, he is able to relate the events of that time in great detail. An old pilgrim brings him a wondrous boy as a playmate, and the boy narrates stories to Franz about the saints which he is able to repeat so well that he astonishes his mother and his benefactor, the abbess. His imagination even conjures up an identity for him as St. Anthony, a story he doubtlessly hears many times. It is appropriate, then, that the leitmotif of his curse is nothing less than St. Anthony’s elixir: to everyone else this relic, kept in a flask in the Capuchin reliquary under Medardus’ “care”— instead of watching over it he imbibes it from time-to-time, as it marks his curse and seems to catalyze the evil in his life—is nothing more than a fine old wine, but to Medardus it is saturated with stories and traditions that become part of his very identity and life story. A very large portion of his memory thus arises from the tales related to him by others, which he voraciously incorporates into his own autobiography. In Kater Murr, memory is at times fragile and at others faulty. The Kreisler biographer laments the sparsity of and irregularities in the materials he must use to piece together Kreisler’s topsy-turvy life. Nevertheless, the manuscript does seem to relate a story, even though the form in which we discover it has been severely altered by Murr’s shredding and rearrangement of the text’s components and their repurposing as padding and blotting paper. In the Murr fragments the autobiographer-cat relates incidents

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  87 linearly and chronologically for the most part. Yet, his memories are sometimes embellished with details that would have been difficult to remember without some external assistance. Additionally, Murr has little trouble appropriating what he hears and reads into his own writings, such as the events leading to his rescue by Abraham, or later his philosophical musings on offering resistance to social conformity, echoing what he has undoubtedly heard or read when under Kreisler’s care and then recorded as if it was his own thought. Again, much of what we read regarding Murr’s memories and thoughts comes from what he has read, overheard, borrowed, or purloined from others, whether he accredits the sources or not. In Hoffmann’s final novel, we discover another liquid leitmotif that perhaps best expresses how Murr constructs at least a large part of the memories about which he writes in his autobiography. When he appropriates Kreisler’s biographical manuscript, dismembers it, and distributes the pages among those of his own text, he places his life in contact with that of the Kapellmeister, figuratively speaking. When the ink of one manuscript is pressed against the other, the blotting process necessitates that some of the ink flows from one page to the other; in a metaphorical sense, one life “bleeds” into the other. Literally, this occurs as well, when Abraham, about to take a trip, hands his cat over to Kreisler for safe-keeping, and so Murr enjoys the opportunities and benefits that life with an artist has to offer. Like the liquid ink transferring from one biographical manuscript to the other, and like the elixir that Medardus imbibes from its flask, the memories and thoughts of others become the liquid nourishment that informs the characters’ lives; they drink up or absorb the stories others provide, and by engaging their very active and creative imaginations in the process, they make them their own.

Notes 1 E.T.A. Hoffmann, Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden: Elixiere des Teufels, Werke 1814-1816, vol. 2/2, ed. Hartmut Steinecke with the collaboration of Gerhard Allroggen, Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker 37 (Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1988), 9–352 (hereafter cited as DKV 2/2 with page references in parenthetical notes in the text). 2 E.T.A. Hoffmann, Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden: Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr, Werke 1820-1821, vol. 5, ed. Hartmut Steinecke with the collaboration of Gerhard Allroggen, Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker 75 (Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1992), 9–458 (hereafter cited as DKV 5 with page references in parenthetical notes in the text). 3 Regarding the complex narrative structure of Elixiere, see Wolfgang Nehring, especially 334–37; see also Detlef Kremer. The complexity of Kater Murr, while reviled in the early scholarship on the novel (e.g., Hans von Müller), has become much celebrated for its sophistication and genial structure; see Hartmut Steinecke; see also Clason, (“Chaotic Contours”). 4 As Nehring; Kremer; Müller; and Clason (“Chaotic Contours”) (among others) point out.

88  Christopher R. Clason 5 Hoffmann’s distinction between das Wunderliche (“the amazing and surprising”) and das Wunderbare (“the miraculous”) is discussed in the narrative frame surrounding the tale “Das öde Haus” (“The Empty House”)—the former refers to that which is unlikely but not impossible, and therefore merely surprising; the later points to the apparent illogic and contrariness to nature of what one has witnessed, and elicits responses of disbelief and uncanniness. 6 Eugene Stelzig calls “the emergence of modern subjectivity, and of a fullfledged literature of the subject … one of the significant developments of the later eighteenth century” (1); see also Paul John Eakin (Fictions in Autobiography) for a discussion of the unique ways various disciplines approach autobiography (e.g., “historians and social scientists attempt to isolate the factual content of autobiography from its narrative matrix, while literary critics, seeking to promote the appreciation of autobiography as an imaginative art, have been willing to treat such texts as though they were indistinguishable from novels,” 3). 7 Goethe’s autobiography has been the gold standard of life writing for many literary critics since the early nineteenth century, although more recently it has come under a great deal of critical scrutiny; for a brief history of reception, see the study by Robert Walther (especially 231–35); Blod examines the issues in far greater detail (11–41). 8 In the introduction to her excellent study of Goethe’s Dichtung und Wahrheit, Blod states the following: “Im Oktober 1811 bittet Goethe Frau von Stein um die Rückgabe der ihr zur Lektüre überlassenen ersten Bücher seiner Autobiographie, die er bei dieser Gelegenheit als sein ‘Lebensmärchen’ bezeichnet. Ähnlich äußert er sich gegenüber Rochlitz, dem er nach der Veröffentlichung des ersten Teils von Aus meinem Leben. Dichtung und Wahrheit bestätigt, dass auch er zu jenen im Vorwort gennanten Freunden gehöre, an die er denke, wenn er seine ‘alten Märchen’ vor sich hin erzähle” (7; “In October 1811, Goethe asked Frau von Stein to return the first books of his autobiography that he had loaned her to read, referring to them on this occasion as his ‘life’s fairy-tale.’ He expressed himself similarly to Rochlitz, to whom he acknowledged after the publication of the first part of From My Life: Poetry and Truth, that he [Rochlitz] also belonged to those friends named in the foreword of whom he thought whenever he read aloud his ‘old fairy tales’” [my translation]). 9 Alan Richardson, “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Literature,” in The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives, ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011), 277–96. 10 Richardson quotes here from two essays: Thomas Suddendorf and Michael Corballis (302); and D. L. Schacter and D. R. Addis (773). 11 The question of the factuality or fictionality of autobiography was being discussed already at the time when Goethe’s famed autobiography Aus meinem Leben: Dichtung und Wahrheit (From My Life: Poetry and Truth) appeared; recent studies include Blod; Maertz; Moore; and, perhaps most importantly for Hoffmann’s reception of Goethe in his final novel, Judit Domány. 12 English translations of quotations from Die Elixiere des Teufels, unless otherwise noted, are from E.T.A. Hoffmann, The Devil’s Elixirs, trans. Ronald Taylor (Richmond, Surrey, UK: Oneworld Classics, 1963 [2008]), hereafter cited as Elixirs with page references in parentheses. 13 My translation; of course, this statement contradicts what Medardus previously mentioned about his experience of the pilgrim with the marvelous child,

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  89 which, as he admits, must have occurred at a time before he could possibly have remembered it, “da meine Mutter nach anderthalb Jahren die heilige Stätte verließ” (DKV 2/2, 16; “for my mother left that holy place after a year and a half” [Elixirs 8]). 14 Nicole Sütterlin identifies this incident as the psychological trauma that “marks” Medardus and causes his neurosis; thus, his life writing functions as a kind of regression therapy, the intent of which is to return to this crucial moment in his past and to reconstruct his life less odiously and sinfully. 15 See, for example, Daemmrich. 16 English translations are taken from E.T.A. Hoffmann, The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr: together with a fragmentary Biography of Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler on Random Sheets of Waste Paper, trans. & notes Anthea Bell, intro. Jeremy Adler, hereafter cited as Tomcat Murr with page references in parentheses. 17 See Julian Knox’s contribution to this volume. 18 See especially Herman Meyer, who addresses how Hoffmann in Kater Murr deals with quotations from numerous authors, and Judit Domány, who focuses specifically on how Hoffmann’s Murr satirized Goethe’s Dichtung und Wahrheit. 19 German text from E.T.A. Hoffmann, Fantasiestücke in Callot’s Manier. Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden, vol. 2/1, ed. Hartmut Steinecke with collab. of Gerhard Allroggen and Wulf Segebrecht (Frankfurt a. M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1993), 32 (hereafter cited as DKV 2/1 with page references in parenthetical notes in the text), my translation. References Hoffmann makes to Kreisler in the Kreisleriana and elsewhere further complicate the question of the Kapellmeister’s identity; critics have often suggested that Kreisler is Hoffmann’s literary “alter-ego,” (beginning perhaps with Hans von Müller’s Kreislerbuch, and cemented into tradition with the biographies of Hoffmann by Harich and Hewlett-Thayer—see George E. Slusser, “Le Neveu de Rameau and Hoffmann’s Johannes Kreisler: Affinities and Influences.” Comparative Literature 27 (1975): 327–43, especially 328–29) —thus, the reader must confront Hoffmann’s playing with the musician’s identity as a case-in-point offered against the general feasibility of biographical writing as an essentially epistemological issue. 20 Hoffmann anticipates the reader’s skepticism at this feature of the biography when he, for example, has the author of the Kreisler biography begin his first “fragment” of volume one, part two with the following statement: “—für den Herausgeber dieser Blätter das angenehmste Ereignis von der Welt, daß er das ganze merkwürdige Gespräch Kreislers mit dem kleinen Geheimen Rat, brühwarm wieder erfuhr” (DKV 5, 125; “—the most welcome thing in the world, to the editor of these pages, to have the whole of Kreisler’s conversation with the little Privy Councillor reported directly” [Tomcat Murr, 83]). 21 Murr’s cavalier playing with other authors’ texts has been discussed most notably by Meyer; Andreas Böhn; and Domány.

Works Cited Barnickel, Claudia. “Die Elixiere des Teufels. Nachgelassene Papiere des Bruders Medardus, eines Kapuziners. Herausgegeben von dem Verfasser der Fantasiestücke in Callots Manier (1815/16).” E.T.A. Hoffmann Handbuch: Leben–Werk–Wirkung. Ed. Christine Lubkoll and Harald Neumeyer. Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler Verlag, 2015. 39–45.

90  Christopher R. Clason Blod, Gabriele. “Lebensmärchen”: Goethes “Dichtung und Wahrheit” als poetischer und poetologischer Text. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2003. 11–41. Böhn, Andreas. “Parody and Quotation: A Case-Study of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Kater Murr.” Parody: Dimensions and Perspectives. Ed. Beate Müller. Rodopi Perspectives in Modern Literature 19. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997. 47–66. Clason, Christopher R. “Chaotic Contours: The Discursive Shape of Hoffmann’s Kater Murr.” Prisms: Essays in Romanticism 12 (2004): 85–100. ———. “Hoffmann’s Die Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr: Mediations at the Border of Nature and Culture.” E.T.A. Hoffmann Jahrbuch 20 (2012): 13–20. Daemmrich, Horst S. The Shattered Self: E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Tragic Vision. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 1973. Domány, Judit. “Begegnungen und Bezugnahmen: Goethes Dichtung und Wahrheit und E.T.A. Hoffmanns Kater Murr.” Goethe: Vorgaben—Zugänge— Wirkungen. Ed. Wolfgang Stellmacher and László Tarnói. Frankfurt a.M.: Peter Lang, 2000. 207–21. Eakin, Paul John. Living Autobiographically: How We Create Identity in Narrative. Ithaca and London: Cornell UP, 2008. ———. Fictions in Autobiography: Studies in the Art of Self-Invention. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1985. Harich, Walther. E.T.A. Hoffmann: das Leben eines Künstlers. 2 vols. Berlin: E. Reiss, 1920. Hewett-Thayer, Harvey W. Hoffmann: Author of the Tales. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1948. Hoffmann, E.T.A. Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden: Elixiere des Teufels, Werke 1814-1816. Vol. 2/2. Ed. Hartmut Steinecke with the collaboration of Gerhard Allroggen. Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker 37. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1988. 9–352 (DKV 2/2, with page references in parentheses). ———. Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden: Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr, Werke 1820-1821. Vol. 5. Ed. Hartmut Steinecke with the collaboration of Gerhard Allroggen. Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker 75. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1992. 9–458 (DKV 5, with page references in parentheses). Kremer, Detlef. “Die Elixiere des Teufels: Nachgelassene Papiere des Bruders Medardus, eines Kapuziners (1815/16).” E.T.A. Hoffmann: Leben–Werk– Wirkung. Ed. De Gruyter Lexikon. Berlin and New York: Walther De Gruyter, 2009. 144–60. Lange, Victor. “Fact in Fiction.” Comparative Literature Studies 6.3 (1969): 253–61. Meyer, Herman. Das Zitat in der Erzählkunst: zur Geschichte und Poetik des europäischen Romans. Stuttgart: Metzler, 1961. 114–34. Müller, Hans von. Das Kreislerbuch: Texte, Compositionen und Bilder von E.T.A. Hoffmann. Leipzig: Insel Verlag, 1903. Nalbantian, Suzanne. “Autobiographical Memory in Modernist Literature and Neuroscience.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 255–75.

Memory, Fact, and Fiction  91 Nalbantian, Suzanne, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland, eds. The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. Nehring, Wolfgang. “E.T.A. Hoffmann: Die Elixiere des Teufels (1815/16).” Romane und Erzählungen der deutschen Romantik: neue Interpretationen. Ed. Paul Michael Lützeler. Stuttgart: Reclam, 1981. 325–50. Richardson, Alan. “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Literature.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 277–96. Schacter, Daniel L., and Donna Rose Addis. “The Cognitive Neuroscience of Constructive Memory: Remembering the Past and Imagining the Future,” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 362 (2007): 773–86. Stelzig, Eugene. The Romantic Subject in Autobiography: Rousseau & Goethe. Charlottesville and London: UP of Virginia, 2000. Suddendorf, Thomas and Michael C. Corballis, “The Evolution of Foresight: What Is Mental Time Travel, and Is It Unique to Humans?” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30 (2007): 299–313. Sütterlin, Nicole. “(Ver-)Brechen der Narration: E.T.A. Hoffmanns Die Elixiere des Teufels als Trauma-Erzählung.” Der andere Blick der Literatur: Perspektiven auf die literarische Wahrnehmung der Wirklichkeit. Ed. Andrea Bartl and Nils Ebert. Konnex: Studien im Schnittbereich von Literatur, Kultur und Natur 11. Würzburg: Königshausen and Neumann, 2014. 217–49. Walther, Robert. “‘Aus dieser fingierten Welt in eine ähnliche wirkliche versetzt’?: Die Theorie der Autobiografie und ein postmoderner Goethe.” Goethe Yearbook 19 (2012): 231–60.

Part II

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4 Memory and Self-Reflection in Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring’s Fairy Tale “Der Greis im Felsen” (1800)* Christina M. Weiler Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring (1775–1833) was a talented writer and active member of Romantic circles.1 She authored fairy tales, plays, poetry, essays, novellas, and novels.2 Her fairy tale “Der Greis im Felsen” (“The Old Man in the Cave”), on which this chapter will focus, first appeared in the third volume of the Bambocciaden in 1800, a journal published by Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring’s first husband, August Ferdinand Bernhardi (1769–1820). In the preface of the volume, Bernhardi states that the tale is not his own, but he does not give his wife credit for her work. Albeit without naming her as the author, he expresses his hopes that this tale and the others in the volume would continue to receive the positive reception that they had found so far (Bernhardi 2). Bernhardi’s comment is indicative of the quality he perceived in Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring’s3 fairy tales. His positive opinion of his wife’s talent was shared by many of their contemporaries, including her brother Ludwig Tieck.4 However, since her death, her writings have found little critical reception and recognition.5 Unlike the works of her famous brother, Sophie Tieck’s works have not been included in the institutionalized memory of the literary canon and have largely been forgotten.6 Only fairly recently, in the twenty-first century, have her fairy tales appeared in new editions.7 Since the works by the male authors of her literary and social circles, particularly those of her famous brother, have overshadowed her own work, Tieck’s writings offer untapped potential for research in the Romantic period. In what follows, I will explore this potential in reference to the study of memory. Her account of memory in her fairy tale “Der Greis im Felsen” distinguishes between the cognitive operations of remembering and recollection. While affective remembering makes it possible to interpret and learn from the past and thus harmonize experiences that require healing, repetitive introspective recollection traps the individual in an unproductive loop that allows for no resolution. * In addition to Christopher R. Clason and Joseph D. Rockelmann, I would like to thank Gabriel Trop for his valuable feedback on an earlier draft of this essay.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-7

96  Christina M. Weiler Tieck’s tale “Der Greis im Felsen” provides new insights into early German Romantic conceptualizations of memory and cognition.8 In the tale, the abstract process of cognition is made visually concrete through the personification of thoughts. Since these thoughts appear as human figures, they can be judged aesthetically. The protagonist of the tale, a young man named Leonhard, asks the eponymous old man of the tale, who is a sorcerer, for the ability to project his own thoughts into the world in order to observe and assess them.9 By creating visual figures outside of himself, Leonhard believes that he will better be able to evaluate his thoughts objectively—as one would judge another person, for example—thus detaching them from his own preconceived notions about the quality of his ideas. This epistemic emphasis on distanced reflection indicates his desire for objective ratio. When Leonhard sees his own thoughts, however, he experiences shock because he expects them to be brilliant and thus beautiful, but they turn out to be grotesque and ugly. By exploring the questionable quality of the protagonist’s thoughts, the tale satirizes narcissistic self-reflection and the notion of the male genius as an embodiment of the Enlightenment ideal of objective ratio. Leonhard becomes trapped in loops of introspective, hyper-conscious thoughts. While his thoughts are stuck in self-reflection, his ideas cannot be new or creative and they thus allow no resolution. Leonhard is able to escape his self-reflective cognitive loops by bypassing the telos-orientation operations of his will through tapping into the unconscious with the help of nature and erotic love. This harmonizing potential of the unconscious, nature, and erotic love is typical for early German Romanticism. The resolution of Leonhard’s issues of being trapped in self-reflection is tied to the resolution of the old sorcerer’s family trauma. The old man caused the emotional wounding of his family through patriarchal oppression. When his elder daughter returned home sick and near death after being abandoned by her husband, the sorcerer refused to forgive her because she had married against his will. This led to the patriarch being cast out of the family unit by the ghost of his wife. Leonhard steps into the memory of this traumatic moment of family rupture, which the sorcerer has encapsulated as a recurring ghostly apparition with the help of his magic powers. In the apparition, the young man falls in love with the sorcerer’s younger daughter and through this new affective bond of erotic love, he is able to heal the old wound of the family trauma. The erotic recovery mediates the traumatic past and gives new life to a lost harmony, which the protagonist ultimately reestablishes. While introspective recollection of ideation is problematic and unproductive in the tale, affectively charged remembering holds the potential of revitalization and healing. The problems of the two male characters and their resolutions are intertwined. Leonhard and the sorcerer heal each other and thus overcome the narcissistic self-reflection trapping the young protagonist and the traumatic wounding of the family holding the old man captive. Thus, the young man escapes his narcissistic recollections of thoughts and

Memory and Self-Reflection  97 achieves creative freedom through new erotic love, and the old man overcomes his patriarchal pride and restores harmony in the fractured family unit by integrating Leonhard into it.

4.1 Family Trauma and the Restoration of Harmony through Love and Memory The tale follows the Romantic triadic structure of loss—longing—and re-established harmony. The loss of harmony is caused by the fragmented family unit of the old sorcerer, whom Leonhard visits to have his wish of seeing his thoughts granted. At the very beginning of the tale, this sorcerer is introduced as a benevolent figure connected with the natural sphere through his forest dwelling.10 The appellation “der Greis im Felsen” (“the old man in the cave”) indirectly characterizes the old man as reclusive and withdrawn from others. The rock of his cave reflects an emotional wall resulting from a rift in his family history.11 At the moment when his oldest daughter was in dire need, the old man nevertheless abandoned her out of a sense of patriarchal pride and thus became estranged from his family. The beginning of the tale alludes to this sudden loss of harmony as the old man observes leaves being cast into the shadows by the wind: der Alte saß vor seiner Hö[h]le, sahe lächelnd, wie die Sonnenstrahlen einzelne Blätter vergoldeten, und wie es nur eines leisen Windes bedurfte, um sie aus dem glänzenden Scheine in den dunklen Schatten zu jagen. O du Bild des menschlichen Glücks, rief er aus, welch ein kleiner Wind darf dich berühren, und du stehst mit allen deinen glänzenden Blüthen in finsterm Schatten! (151–52) the old man sat before his cave, smiling. He watched the sunbeams gilding each leaf and observed how only the gentlest breeze was necessary to chase the leaves out of the brilliant shimmering into the darkest shadows! “Oh, you image of human fate,” he exclaimed. “A small wind can touch you, and then suddenly you stand with all your brilliant blossoms in sinister shadow!” (77) The golden leaves being cast into darkness reflect his own fate, the loss of his personal Golden Age of family harmony, and his subsequent status as an outcast. At the end of the tale, harmony is restored by integrating the young man into the family through the loving bond with the old man’s daughter.12 Leonhard heals the wound in the sorcerer’s family unit by becoming part of it. The memories of the traumatic rift within the old man’s family haunt him. In the tale, this is represented by the ghost of his dead wife, with whom he converses through his magical powers. His wife Elwire cast him

98  Christina M. Weiler out of the family circle due to his unwillingness to forgive his older daughter for marrying a man without his approval. Elwire’s ghost accuses him of misunderstanding the nature of true fatherly love through his unwillingness to forgive and forget the perceived trespass of his disobedient daughter.13 This family tragedy marks the central conflict of the tale and becomes intertwined with Leonhard’s quest for knowledge and his discovery of love. The old man’s traumatic memories of the rift between him and his kin serve as a catalyst for Leonhard’s self-actualization, while Leonhard’s love for the sorcerer’s daughter mends the fragmented family unit. By helping the young man, the old man thus ultimately also helps himself.14 The process of healing is cyclical and reciprocal. Through the new bond between Leonhard and the sorcerer’s daughter, old grudges are forgiven and forgotten, and lost harmony is restored.15

4.2 Visualization of Thoughts and Memories At the beginning of his quest, Leonhard directs his gaze inward—toward himself and his own thoughts—rather than outward toward nature and others. He justifies his wish for the power to see his thoughts to the old sorcerer by declaring absolute knowledge as the highest human good; the sorcerer responds to this by highlighting the importance of understanding in the quest for knowledge: “Glaubst du nicht, daß des Menschen edelstes Bestreben ist, fuhr der Jüngling fort, alles in und außer sich zu erkennen und besonders in sich?—Nachdem man es versteht,’ sagte der Greis” (153; “‘Do you not believe that the most noble goal of humanity,’ the youth continued, ‘is knowing everything in its innermost and outermost essence, and particularly everything within one’s own self?’ ‘I do, but only after one has truly comprehended it all,’ said the old man” [78]). This dialogue at the beginning of the tale establishes a temporal and causal distinction between “erkennen” (“knowing”) and “verstehen” (“understanding”). The German verb “erkennen” that Leonhard employs here signifies an immediate action and has both epistemological and visual connotations: this is indicative of the strong connection that Leonhard makes between seeing and knowing. According to the sorcerer, knowing can only be achieved after understanding, and it is not possible without it. Unlike “erkennen,” which happens instantaneously, “verstehen” requires time because experiences need to first be interpreted before they can be understood. In order to learn from past events, remembering and processing them is necessary. Thus, memory plays an essential role in the pursuit of meaning. As the tale develops, Leonhard’s experiences challenge his assumptions about the benefits of seeing one’s own thoughts, and he discovers that the true epistemological power for self-discovery belongs to memory, nature, and love. Cognitive processes are presented as personifications of the internal workings of the soul in the tale. The old man promises to enhance the youth’s visual sense so that he can see his thoughts as personified creations of his soul; he grants Leonhard his wish but warns him of its implications:

Memory and Self-Reflection  99 Es ist weniger, als du glaubst, sagte der Alte, aber ich glaube nicht, daß du mir für dieß Geschenk danken wirst; ich thue nichts weiter, als daß ich deinen Augen eine größere Kraft mittheile, damit du die Gestalten, welche deine Seele erzeugt und in die Welt sendet, erblicken magst, aber ich sage es noch einmal, du wirst mir nicht danken. (153) “It is less than you think,” said the old man, “but I do not believe that you will thank me for this gift. I will do nothing more than increase the strength of your vision so that you may see the images your soul creates and sends out into the world. But I repeat: you will not thank me.” (78) The old man warns Leonhard that the enhanced vision he wishes for will be a burden rather than a tool in the pursuit of knowledge. Since these projections are creations of his own soul, they externalize the internal and thus give him insights about himself rather than knowledge about the world. This outside perspective on his own thoughts exposes Leonhard to the danger of narcissistic self-absorption. After his wish has been granted, his first thought focuses on how much he will gain through his new ability to judge others and the truth: “Zu welcher neuen Weisheit bahnt mir diese Sehkraft den Weg? Ich werde mit scharfen Blicken alles prüfen, und ich nur allein, werde über mich und den Menschen mit Wahrheit urtheilen können” (154; “What new wisdom will I attain using this new vision? I will examine everything with an incisive gaze, and I alone will be able truly to judge myself and all humankind” [78]). This self-righteous, judgmental thought, which reflects a belief in the Enlightenment methods of examination and categorization, materializes itself as a grotesque figure: “da erblickte er zu seinen Füßen eine kleine, blinde, verwachsene Figur, die eine ungeheure Brille auf der Nase trug” (154; “at his feet he suddenly saw a small, short-sighted, misshapen figure wearing a huge pair of spectacles on his nose” [78]). Tieck’s ableist tropes concerning the small body size of this figure indicate its insignificance, while its short-sightedness condemns it to narrow-mindedness as well as a limited perspective. The spectacles further evoke the association of an excessive book learning detached from first-hand experience. The “misshapenness” of the figure reflects the grotesqueness of Leonhard’s thoughts.16 He is shocked when he sees this figure: Leonhard erschrack vor dem Anblicke dieses lächerlichen Unholds und wollte entfliehen, da zerflatterte das Wesen in der Luft. Wie! rief der Jüngling erstaunt, sollte dies das Bild meines Gedankens sein?— er dachte diesen Gedanken noch einmal, und die lächerliche Gestalt kam mit ihrer Brille ihm wieder näher. (154–55)

100  Christina M. Weiler Leonhard shrank back at the sight of this ridiculous monster and was about to run away when the creature disappeared into thin air. “What on earth!” cried the astonished youth. “Was that supposed to be the embodiment of my thoughts?” He thought the same thought again, and the ridiculous figure with the spectacles approached again. (78) Leonhard overestimates the epistemic potential of the ability to visualize his own thoughts and their quality. He is thus unpleasantly surprised when repeatedly confronted with the personification of his “imperfect” thought as he recalls it. Thinking the thought again—and thus recalling the same idea—leads to the reappearance of the same figure. This expression of recollection as a repetition of figures highlights the unproductive self-absorption of Leonhard’s contemplations. In the beginning, the young man lacks the insight to understand his own cognitive shortcomings. Instead, he accuses the old man of evil sorcery and blames him for what he is seeing. This immature scapegoating is reflected in the personification of this thought: “Boshafter Zaubrer, rief Leonhard, du spottest meiner und willst mir meine Gedanken so entstellt zeigen. Als er diese Worte ausgesprochen hatte, erblickte er neben sich ein Kind, das ihn mit überaus dummen Augen ansah, und auf die lächerliche Mißgestalt zueilte und sich zu ihr gesellte” (155; “‘You evil sorcerer!’ cried Leonhard. ‘You mock me and are trying to show me my thoughts all distorted.’ After he spoke these words, he saw near him a child who stared at him with an utterly stupid look, then hurried to catch up with and join the misshapen figure” [78]). In another ableist trope, Leonhard’s following immature thought is personified as a child with a doltish expression. The apparition of the second figure makes Leonhard realize that the visual representations of his thoughts do not live up to his expectations: “Nun, sagte Leonhard spottend, da muß ich gestehen, ein Paar vortreffliche Abdrücke von sich, hat meine Seele in die Welt gesendet” (155; “‘Well,’ said Leonhard with contempt, ‘I have to admit, my soul has sent a fine pair of replicas of itself out into the world’” [78]). He identifies the figures as “Abdrücke” (“replicas”) of his own soul. This implies that thoughts are not detached from the human self but that their quality is closely linked to the core of the individual human identity. Leonhard’s angry meta-cognitive thought about the shortcomings of the figures is projected into another personification: “so stand noch ein Bube mit schwarzen krausen Haaren und feurigen Augen, neben dem andern, und sahe sie erbittert an” (155; “a young lout with black curly hair and fiery eyes stood next to the others and looked at them with hatred” [78]). The personified visual representations of Leonhard’s thoughts are based on his metaphorical projections of their abstract qualities onto external human characteristics in the respective figures. Only when Leonhard has the insight to regret that he asked the sorcerer to grant him his wish does the first “tolerable” figure appear to Leonhard’s imagination:

Memory and Self-Reflection  101 Ein Knabe mit schlichten blonden Haaren und blauen Augen, nicht schön und nicht ungestaltet, stand neben ihm, sein Gesicht war nicht dumm und nicht verständig; … Nun, das ist sauber! rief Leonhard erzürnt; von vier Gedanken ißt kaum einer erträglich, und auch dieser eine, ist er nicht ein Gedanke der Reue, was kann er mir also helfen? (155–56) A young boy with straight blond hair and blue eyes, not handsome and not misshapen, stood next to him; his face was neither stupid nor intelligent. … “Well, this is a fine state of affairs!” Leonhard cried angrily. “Of my four thoughts so far, only one is even slightly tolerable, and even this one is a thought of regret, so what good is he to me?” (78–79) It is ironic that the first productive insight to come out of his new ability is one of regret. The first four personifications of Leonhard’s thoughts disturb him deeply, and his thought projections soon exert a disruptive influence on his very ability to think at all.

4.3 Unruly Memories: Cognitive Loops and Elusive Recollections Leonhard’s visually enhanced reflections of his own thoughts lead to a paralysis, which humbles him intellectually. He tries to produce better thoughts, but he is unable to do so deliberately.17 The harder he tries to force himself to produce a better thought, the more he stunts this creative process. Trying to force his imagination has the opposite effect of what he intends to do as it only further restricts his creativity. As Leonhard attempts to subjugate his thought processes, he only rehashes the same thoughts, and their projected personifications encircle him. Thus, through this fixation on the quality of his cognitive output, he is unable to have new creative thoughts, as the reflections on his fossilized thoughts that loop in his mind impede the creation of new ideas. He is trapped in a circle of recollections of his own thoughts.18 In contrast to the productive processing of past experiences through affective remembering, this intrusive cognitive loop—a cyclical recalling of thoughts that is directed inward—is unproductive.19 Leonhard is trapped in a loop of recollecting ideas. His recall of previous thoughts calls the same figures back to him, and this blocks the appearance of new ideas. The conscious mental effort and the resulting loop of ideas—of rehashing the same thoughts—does not allow for free creativity but rather forces cognitive stagnation. The young man discovers, however, that he is able to create beautiful figures when he is not consciously aware of his own thoughts in nature. While he walks through the forest, the natural surroundings calm his mind and set free a beautiful subconscious thought:

102  Christina M. Weiler Sein Weg führte ihn durch den dichtesten Theil des Waldes; hehe, hundertjährige Eichen rauschten über ihm, und sein Herz wurde ergriffen; seine vier Gedanken verließen ihn; heilige Schauer zogen durch seine Brust, und er hatte seine Bitte, die er dem Greise gethan hatte, ganz vergessen; endlich erreichte er den Ausgang des Waldes, doch als er die Stadt mit ihren Thürmen vor sich sahe, blickte er auf und bemerkte, daß von seiner Seite ein schöner Jüngling hinweg flatterte, und die vier Gestalten schwebten in weiter Ferne und eilten, ihn wieder zu erreichen. Leonhard bemühte sich den Gedanken, der ihn so schön und freundlich durch den Wald begleitet hatte, zurück zu rufen, aber seine Anstrengung war vergeblich; je eifriger er sich bemühte sich zu erinnern, um so eifriger drängten sich seine albernen Gefährten hinzu. (156–57) His path led through the deepest part of the forest; tall, ancient oaks rustled above him, and his heart was moved. His four thoughts left him, a devout awe flowed through his breast, and he totally forgot his request to the old man. Finally, he reached the path out of the forest. When he saw the towers of the city before him, he looked up and noticed a handsome youth fluttering away from his side, and the four figures floating off in the distance were now hurrying back to him again. Leonhard tried to recall the thoughts that had accompanied him so well in the forest, but his efforts were in vain. The more zealously he tried to remember, the more eagerly his foolish companions rushed in on him. (79) In the forest, Leonhard reaches a state of serenity. Nature frees him from quotidian distractions, and his free imagination allows him to create beautiful, personified thoughts.20 However, the moment Leonhard approaches the city, he becomes self-consciously aware again of his own reflections. As soon as he consciously perceives his own thoughts, he loses the appealing vision, and he is unable to recall it again. Instead, he is swarmed by his returning previous thoughts, which he tries in vain to forget. He cannot remember the thoughts he tries to hold on to. This shows that the human subject is not fully in control of the cognitive processes of remembering and forgetting. Through the visualization of Leonhard’s thoughts as aesthetically appealing or repulsive, his cognitive processes are linked to the process of aesthetic production. In the tale, conscious thought is a potential hindrance in aesthetic creation; Leonhard comes to the realization that it is instead the unconscious that aids his productive thought-creation:21 “Also nur unwissend ist es mir möglich, etwas Gutes zu denken, sagte er” (157; “‘So that means I can have good thoughts only when I am not aware of them,’ he said” [79]). When Leonhard thinks freely in nature

Memory and Self-Reflection  103 without a specific telos, he is able to produce a beautiful personified thought. Only when he stops trying, can he achieve this objective.22 The edge of the forest as a liminal space provokes the negative change in Leonhard’s cognitive processes. When he sees the towers of the city, he loses the beautiful thought projection, and the first four repellant figures reappear. This indicates a negative influence on creative thought by the restrictions of society, which is metonymically represented by the city. The natural sphere promotes an appealing creativity, whereas civilization provokes a rehashing of deficient, conventional thoughts. Not introspection, but connection with nature leads to thoughts of high aesthetic quality in the tale. Like nature, erotic love and affective memories hold a strong heuristic potential. In the city, Leonhard is confronted with human suffering through a ghostly apparition. He sees the vision of a young woman standing at the bed of her gravely ill sister while the sick woman’s two small children are wailing on the floor. What draws Leonhard towards this apparition is compassion for their suffering: “Mitleid riß ihn hin, er öffnete die Thür des Hauses und trat in das ärmliche Zimmer” (158; “Pity drew him inside; he opened the door of the house and stepped into the sparse room” [79]). He enters the space of the affectively charged scene, but when he touches the young woman, the apparition dissolves. Leonhard is not able to hold on to the image. He is only able to feel her hand in his for a moment before she disappears in front of his eyes, which sparks a chain of confused thoughts: viele Gedanken schwebten vor seinen Augen; sie folgten schnell aufeinander; er dachte keinen vollständig, und alle verschränkten sich in einander, so daß die wunderbarsten Gedanken vor ihm schwebten und einen seltsamen Tanz zu bilden schienen. Seine Verwunderung über das verschwundene Mädchen verlohr sich bald in ein Betrachten dieser Phantome, dadurch wurden sie noch vermehrt. Leonhard wußte sich nicht zu fassen, er gerieth in Wuth über diese ihm sichtbaren Gedanken, aber eben durch diese Wuth wurden neue erzeugt, ohne daß er die alten von sich zu entfernen vermochte. (160) many thoughts floated before his eyes. They followed in rapid succession, none of them thought to completion, and each was clasped to the other so that the most wondrous thoughts floated before him and seemed to form a mysterious dancing circle. His befuddlement about the vanished girl gradually faded as he considered these phantoms, but that only increased their number. Leonhard could not compose himself; he became enraged by the visible thoughts, which only resulted in the formation of new ones without the elimination of the old. (80)

104  Christina M. Weiler The supernatural apparition of the traumatic family scene sets a chain of unfinished thoughts into motion that Leonhard is unable to control. His reflection on the visual projection of these thoughts and his confusion about them only add to his mental dissociation. None of these unfinished cognitive processes leads to a deeper insight, which shows that distanced thought reflection is not an adequate means to gain understanding of traumatic ideation. Frustrated by his confusing thought projections, Leonhard runs home, lies down and after struggling with his invasive thoughts for a while, finally falls asleep. In his dreams, when he is free of his thought reflections, Leonhard re-encounters the apparition of the young girl as the unconscious dream experience enables him to reconnect with her. He declares his love for her, which she returns, and he embraces her. When he awakes, he tries again in vain to recall his memory of her: “er bemühte sich … das holde Bild herbei zu zaubern, aber vergeblich” (161; “[h]e tried to … conjure up that fair image again, but in vain” [81]). While his unconscious dream allows him access to the magical apparition, conscious efforts cannot recall the desired image. Leonhard encounters the young woman again in the cave of the old man. During this encounter, she loses a red rose from her hair, and when Leonhard tries to pick up the rose, it wilts in his hands.23 He can perceive it visually, but it does not hold up under his tactile sense. Like an elusive memory, the rose fades. When Leonhard shifts his focus inward and thus on himself again rather than outward to his beloved, she escapes him like a fleeting thought he tries to recall. After imagining what it would be like to share all of his material possessions with his beloved, he dreams of losing his house with his belongings in a fire. “Er träumte wie sein Haus in Flammen stände, er strebte und arbeitete, etwas von seinem Vermögen aus dem Feuer zu erretten, kein Gedanke an seine Liebe kam ihm vor” (171–72; “He dreamed that his house stood in flames. He strained and struggled to save some of his valuables from the fire, and no thought of his love occurred to him” [84]). Leonhard seems to regress in his character development as he shifts his focus back on himself and his belongings in his dream. The fire appears as a destructive force that consumes Leonhard’s material possessions. This loss of his home and personal property is reflective of the loss of an old life that he has to leave behind in his quest for self-actualization. The flames that consume his belongings represent the poetic experience of love that serves as a catalyst for his development.24 In his dream, the loss of his old property consumes Leonhard so completely that he forgets about his beloved, producing a temporary regression due to an attachment to an earlier developmental stage. However, Leonhard is able to distance himself from the dream when he remembers it later. Memory allows him to process and interpret the dream narrative, and he is able to see how his attachment to his material belongings, and thus to his old self, no longer aligns with his newfound ideal of erotic love.

Memory and Self-Reflection  105 Nature, affective memory, and love free Leonhard of his conscious reflections, and the resulting subconscious thoughts are projected outward as the most aesthetically appealing figures. In the forest, he is able to recall the image of the girl’s dream apparition and, as a result, he sees for the first time several truly beautiful projections of his own thoughts. At first, the trees remind him of his earlier serene walk in the forest: “Als die Eichen und Buchen über ihm rauschten, erinnerte er sich, welche sanfte Empfindung sein Herz bewegte, als er am vorigen Abend in dem Schatten dieser Bäume ging” (170; “As the oaks and beeches rustled over his head, he recalled the gentle feelings that had moved his heart on the previous evening as he had walked in the shadows of these trees” [84]). This act of remembering is triggered by sound. The rustling of the leaves reminds him of his state of serenity that allowed him to think freely. This aurally activated memory leads to a recollection of the visual encounter with the ghostlike girl and her family. “[Er] dachte nun daran wie er das Mädchen in dem kleinen Hause sahe, und eine innige Sehnsucht erfüllte sein Herz, so lebendig erschienen vor seiner Seele alle ihre Bewegungen” (170; “He thought of how he had seen the girl in the small cottage, and all her movements appeared so vividly before his soul that a deep longing filled his heart” [84]). The experience of sublime nature has transformed Leonhard. It has made him receptive to seeing others. This enables him to redirect his thoughts from his self-centered quest for knowledge to his affectionate memories of the young woman suffering in the traumatic family scene. His love for her allows him to move away from his self-centeredness. The memory of their encounter is more powerful than the original experience of encountering the apparition of the young woman because Leonhard is able to process the memory differently in hindsight. Thinking of her opens up his soul to magical experiences: und je mehr er an sie dachte, je tiefer schlich der Zauber in sein Herz, er blickte auf zu den Baumwipfeln, und eine selige Freude zuckte mit ihren Sonnenstrahlen durch seine Seele, er senkte den Blick auf den Boden, und ängstlich beklemmt sahe er das Gras und die Blumen sich bewegen; kleine blaue Vergißmeinnicht standen am Boden, und ihm war als wenn sie ihn mit unschuldig liebenden Augen ansähen. (170–71) The more he thought of her, the deeper the magic crept into his soul. He stared up at the treetops, and a blissful joy rushed with all its sunbeams through his heart. His gaze fell to the ground, and, strangely moved, he looked at the grass and flowers swaying. Small blue forget-me-nots grew on the ground, and it seemed as if they looked up at him with innocent, loving blue eyes. (84)

106  Christina M. Weiler The flowers seem to be gazing back at him. Here, unlike in the earlier encounters with apparitions of the young woman, the sensory experience of the flowers translates from the visual into the tactile without fading: er bückte sich und brach eins von dem Stengel, um es an seine Lippen zu drücken. Da dachte er an die Rose die er in seinem Busen verbarg, er nahm sie hervor und sie blühte von neuem in ihrer höchsten Schönheit; er küßte sie entzückt, und ihm war als ob die Lippen seiner Geliebten den Kuß erwiederten. Er blickte auf, und viele liebliche Kinder mit goldgelben Haaren gaukelten in unschuldigen Spielen um ihn her. Dies erste Mal war Leonhard mit seinen Gedanken zufrieden. (171) He bent and plucked one from its stem to press to his lips. Then he remembered the rose he had hidden next to his heart; he drew it out, and it blossomed again in his hand in its most ineffable beauty. He kissed it in ecstasy, and it seemed to him as if the lips of his beloved returned the kiss. He looked up and saw several charming children with golden hair romping in innocent games around him. This was the first time that Leonhard had been at peace with his thoughts. (84) The visual becomes tactile here, which reflects the redemptive and creative potential of the new bond between Leonhard and his beloved. The harmonizing power of affective memory and erotic love is represented through floral metaphors. The forget-me-not is associated with memory through its name, while erotic love is symbolized through a red rose. Leonhard kisses the forget-me-not, which stands for both nature and memory, and this reminds him of the rose, the symbol of love. The floral symbols highlight the interconnectedness of the individual with nature and others. The blue of the forget-me-nots also reflects the blue of the eyes of the girl that Leonhard falls in love with.25 Through the blue forget-me-nots, he is reminded of his beloved, and by connecting with her, he reaches his objective of self-actualization.26 Leonhard’s serene thoughts are visualized as playful, charming, and innocent children, and the golden hair of these children evokes the association of the utopian Golden Age. Inherent in this image is the Romantic notion of the lost Golden Age, the triadic structure of loss—longing—and re-established harmony, which also appears doubly reflected in the tale’s plot. First, Leonhard loses his ability to think clearly, then struggles with his own self-reflective thought loops, and finally finds self-recognition on a higher level. Second, a similar triadic structure can be seen in the subplot of Leonhard’s love for the ghostly young woman because it reestablishes lost harmony on the level of the family unit. He learns that his beloved is the younger daughter of the sorcerer and the traumatic family scene is revealed to be that of the moment the sorcerer was cast out of his family. In order to protect his

Memory and Self-Reflection  107 younger daughter from a similar fate as that suffered by his older one, the sorcerer has enchanted her so that she exists in a ghostlike state. This has made it possible for Leonhard to step into the traumatic scene from the sorcerer’s memory in which the old man enchanted his younger daughter together with the rest of his family—his older daughter, his grandchildren, and the ghost of his wife. Only profound, true love holds the power to free the younger daughter—Leonhard’s beloved—from this limited existence.27 Until then, the haunting scene of the family gathered around the sickbed of the older daughter appears once a year on the day the sorcerer refused to forgive her. The apparition is a cyclical representation of the traumatic experience that holds him and his kin captive. Through Leonhard’s love for the sorcerer’s younger daughter, she is released from her ghostly state, and as the old man apologizes for his cold-heartedness, he is forgiven by his family and the lost harmony is restored.

4.4 Conclusion: Memory’s Healing Potential and the Satirized Male Genius In the Romantic triadic structure of loss—longing—and re-established harmony, memory carries the potential for healing. After the old man narrates the story of his family trauma to Leonhard, the young man is able to heal the rift in the family structure through his love for the sorcerer’s younger daughter.28 Leonhard’s quest for knowledge leads him ultimately to the insight that he needs to direct his gaze outward rather than inward. Nature facilitates this shift from narcissistic self-reflection to love. This is symbolized through the flower, the forget-me-not. In the tale, nature reminds the protagonist not to forget his beloved, and this shift from selfreflexive cognition to affective memory restores the lost harmony.29 The repellent images of Leonhard’s narcissistic thought reflections contrast sharply with the appealing figures that he is able to create subconsciously under the harmonizing influence of nature and love. This shows a transition from ideals of rational reflection to affective connection, which is symptomatic of an epistemic change in early German Romanticism: the unifying Romantic potential of nature and erotic love challenges the artificially detached ratio of the Enlightenment. The author satirizes the male hero and his striving for universal knowledge as manifest in Leonhard’s excessive self-reflection on his deficient thought projections.30 He is not the male genius he believed himself to be. On a meta-level, this can be read as a critique of masculine overconfidence supported by a patriarchal society that enforces these unfounded notions of superiority; the core of the tale visualizes and uncovers the deficiencies of Leonhard’s thoughts. Leonhard comes to realize that the value he attributed to the quality of his own thoughts was false. Through its satirical elements, the tale criticizes the male character’s self-righteous and selfperpetuating thoughts that hinder creativity. Leonhard must leave his misguided notions of himself as a male genius behind to restore the lost

108  Christina M. Weiler order at the end of the tale and heal the rift caused by the patriarchal pride of the old man. Only when the male subject remembers his beloved and refocuses his quest away from knowledge toward loving connection can harmony be re-established.

Notes 1 Shawn Jarvis and Jeannine Blackwell note that Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring was “a member of German Romantic circles in Berlin” (75). Alan Corkhill also highlights her active engagement in Romantic circles: “Although raised within the artisan class, upward social mobility secured Sophie qualified entry into intellectual circles, such as the Berlin salons, where she participated actively in debates on women’s rights and social equality in general” (120). She also contributed to the Athenäum. As Rose Kaulitz-Niedeck points out, “[i]hre Essays nahmen die Schlegels gern im Athenäum auf … Sie zeigte sich darin als selbständige, klare Denkerin” (671; “the Schlegels happily included her essays in the Athenäum … In them, she showed herself as an independent, clear thinker”; all translations of German secondary sources are my own unless otherwise indicated). 2 For more information on her publications, see Haberstock (11), Eschler (18 and 311–16), and Jarvis and Blackwell (75). 3 From here on out, I will refer to Sophie Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring by her family name “Tieck” to be more concise. To avoid confusion with her brother, I will refer to Ludwig Tieck by his first and last name in my chapter. 4 Percy Matenko, Edwin H. Zeydel, and Bertha M. Masche state that “Sophie and Ludwig Tieck showed each other the products of their poetic attempts, helping and encouraging each other through frank criticism. That [Ludwig] Tieck thought highly of her ability in this direction is shown by the numerous occasions on which he invited her candid opinion of his later works” (274). They further highlight that Ludwig “Tieck’s enthusiastic and appreciative praise of her literary efforts was a source of great encouragement to her. Of her fairy tales, which were published in 1802, he wrote her very favorably. In a letter to his brother Friedrich, he commented glowingly on the poetic qualities of her novel Evremont which he published after her death” (276). 5 The reception of her work has been very limited. This contrasts with the reception of her famous brother Ludwig Tieck (1773–1853), who has been called the “king of Romanticism” (“Der König der Romantik”) (Günzel 6; Günzel also uses this appellation in the title of his biography König der Romantik: Das Leben des Dichters Ludwig Tieck in Briefen, Selbstzeugnissen und Berichten [King of Romanticism: The Life of the Author Ludwig Tieck in Letters, Personal Accounts, and Reports]). 6 Astrid Erll and Ansgar Nünning point out the function of “[t]he canon and literary history as institutionalized memory of literary studies and society” (264). They state that “[t]his concept refers to the idea of an inner-literary memory in the sense of a genitivus objectivus. Through the writing of literary history and the formation of canons, the field of literary studies—and not just literature—is involved in the creation and maintenance of cultural memory” (264; italics in the original). For a discussion of the reasons for the limited recognition and reception of female German authors of the eighteenth and nineteenth century, see Susanne Kord. Kord states “[d]aß die Tradierung und Überlieferung der Werke von Schriftstellerinnen vor dem 20. Jahrhundert erst so spät eingesetzt hat …, ist auf verschiedene Faktoren zurückzuführen. Dazu

Memory and Self-Reflection  109 gehören u.a. die erheblichen Schwierigkeiten bei der Quellenforschung …; die Unzugänglichkeit der Werke …; und schließlich auch die Tatsache, daß jede(r) feministisch Forschende zunächst mit dem traditionellen Literaturtraining und Literaturverständnis aufgewachsen ist und selbst nach ausführlichem Kontakt mit Frauenliteratur noch gegen die perfide, weil weitgehend unbewußt gewordene Überzeugung ankämpfen muß: Frauenliteratur ist allenfalls von historischem Interesse, literarisch minderwertig, unwichtig, nicht ‘ewig’; das Genie ist männlich” (12; “the fact that the tradition and transmission of the works of female authors before the twentieth century has started so late is due to different factors. There are among others the significant difficulties in researching sources …; the inaccessibility of the works …; and finally the fact that every feminist researcher has first grown up with the traditional literary training and understanding of literature and even after extensive contact with women’s literature still has to fight against the [following] belief, which is perfidious because now largely subconscious: women’s literature is at best of historical interest, literature of less quality, unimportant, not ‘eternal’; the genius is male”). 7 In 2000, a new German-language edition of Sophie Tieck’s fairy tale collection Wunderbilder und Träume (Marvelous Images and Dreams, 1802) appeared, edited by Hannelore Scholz; this collection has also been republished in 2015 in an edition by Michael Holzinger. Wunderbilder und Träume is a collection of eleven fairy tales, which do not include “Der Greis im Felsen.” The tale is however included in a 2015 edition of works of August Ferdinand Bernhardi and Sophie Tieck titled Reliquien and edited by Hannelore ScholzLübbering. The tale has also been published in English translation as “The Old Man in the Cave” in a 2001 collection of fairy tales by German women authors from 1780 to 1900 titled The Queen’s Mirror and edited by Shawn C. Jarvis and Jeannine Blackwell. I will make use of the English translation by Blackwell from this collection in my chapter by providing it after the German original from the Bambocciaden; hereafter, I will cite both the original and the translation of the tale with page references in parenthetical notes in the text. There has been little research on Sophie Tieck and her work; however, the following sources are noteworthy: The pioneering academic study on Sophie Tieck’s work in Moses Breuer’s dissertation (1914) primarily focuses on biographical information, summaries of her works, and themes. The two monographs on Tieck and her work by Monika Haberstock (2001) and Ewa Eschler (2005) present compelling insights. Further, an essay collection edited by Wolfgang von Bruyn and Barbara Gribnitz (2011), focusing on the work of Sophie Tieck and Caroline de la Motte Fouque has advanced the research on her works. It is noteworthy that the few studies on Tieck that have appeared so far have almost exclusively been written in German. 8 Birgit Neumann highlights the potential that the analysis of literary texts holds for understanding memory in a particular period: “In their world-creation, literary works resort to culturally predominant ideas of memory, and, through their literary techniques, represent these ideas in an aesthetically condensed form. This cultural preformation of literature also implies that narrative techniques are not transhistorical constants, but rather historically variable strategies which offer interpretive patterns specific to particular epochs” (335). 9 He wishes to see his own thoughts like an outside observer: “Ich wünsche sagte der Jüngling, daß du mir die Gabe verleihen mögest, alle meine Gedanken, wenn ich sie in mir ausgearbeitet habe, vor mir zu erblicken, damit ich beurtheilen möge, was meine Seele denkt, ob es gut oder böse, klug oder einfältig genannt zu werden verdient” (153; “‘I wish,’ said the youth, ‘that you

110  Christina M. Weiler would bestow on me the gift of seeing my own thoughts standing before me after I have crafted them, so that I might be able to judge what my soul is thinking and whether it deserves to be called good or evil, clever or naïve’” [78]). 10 The sorcerer lives in the middle of the forest: “Schon seit langer Zeit lebte im dunkelsten Theile des Waldes ein Greis, den Niemand kannte; er wurde in der ganzen Gegend umher nur der Greis im Felsen oder der wohlthätige Zauberer genannt; denn jeder der zu ihm kam und seinen Rath begehrte, ging getröstet hinweg” (151; “In a time long past there lived in the darkest part of the forest an old man whom no one knew. In the whole region thereabouts he was called ‘The Old Man in the Cave’ or ‘The Kind Sorcerer,’ for everyone who came to him and sought his counsel went away consoled” [77]). 11 The motif of stone symbolizing emotional coldness and estrangement can also be found in other later Romantic tales. The motif features prominently in Wilhelm Hauff’s fairy tale “Das kalte Herz” (“The Cold Heart,” 1827), in which the protagonist makes a deal with an evil sorcerer and has his heart replaced with a stone in exchange for financial riches. It also appears in the context of family estrangement in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s tale “Das steinerne Herz” (“The Heart of Stone,” 1817). In “Der Greis im Felsen,” Leonhard uses the motif of a cold heart in a discussion with the old man about love, accusing him of being dead to his feelings: “Du hast ein kaltes Herz sagte Leonhard, und bist den Gefühlen der Jugend abgestorben” (169; “‘You have a cold heart,’ said Leonhard, ‘and are numb to all the emotions of youth’” [84]). 12 The happy ending of the young man marrying the sorcerer’s daughter is already anticipated at the beginning of the tale when the young man greets the sorcerer with “alter Vater” (152; “ancient father” [77]), thereby foreshadowing that the sorcerer will become his father-in-law. 13 “Du mißbrauchst, rief sie, die schönste Empfindung der Menschen, die Liebe, zum Haß, und darum bist du der Liebe nicht werth. Geh! verlaß dies Haus, das nur der Aufenthalt der Liebe war, und wohne unter den Thieren des Waldes; mich siehst du nicht wieder, bis Liebe und Mitleid das wieder gut machen, was dein Haß und deine Härte verdarben” (176; “‘You are abusing love, the most sublime feeling of all humanity,’ she cried, ‘in hatred. And for that reason you are not worthy of love. Go! Leave this house, which was the only abode of love, and live among the animals of the forest. You will not see me again, until love and compassion have repaired what your hatred and harshness have ruined’” [86]). 14 The pattern of the mentor finding insight and self-actualization through his student is reminiscent of the dynamic between Parzival and the Fisher King in the medieval Parzival legend. King Amfortas and Sir Parzival, both of whom have neglected the fulfillment of their true inner dispositions, heal each other (see Campbell 392–93, 443–60, 561–70). 15 The old man and Leonhard are parallel characters in the tale who mutually aid each other in their character development. The old man helps Leonhard in his quest for knowledge and self-actualization, and Leonhard frees the old man from the family trauma that holds him captive. The connection between the old sorcerer and Leonhard is highlighted when Leonhard meets the sorcerer’s family. Leonhard is drawn into the family through compassion: “Mitleid riß ihn hin, er öffnete die Thür des Hauses und trat in das ärmliche Zimmer” (158; “Pity drew him inside; he opened the door of the house and stepped into the sparse room” [79]). This strongly resonates with the old man’s description of the scene of his older daughter’s return as he remembers it: “Ich näherte mich voll Mitleid; aber diese wohltätige Empfindung ging in

Memory and Self-Reflection  111 Zorn über, als ich meine älteste Tochter in der Kranken erkannte” (176; “I approached with great sympathy, but this benevolent feeling turned to rage when I recognized the sick woman as my eldest daughter” [86]). Both the old man and Leonhard feel compassion when they encounter the scene of suffering for the first time, although—unlike Leonhard’s compassion—the old man’s sympathy turns into rage when he recognizes his older daughter who disobeyed him, which causes the rift that Leonhard’s love for the younger daughter heals. Furthermore, the two male characters become inseparably connected through magic cyphers—“magisch[e] Zeichen” (165; “magic symbols” [82])—that Leonhard subconsciously draws into the sand. These cyphers force the old man to remember his wrongdoings until Leonhard erases and immediately forgets them. While the symbols disappear again in the sand as Leonhard wipes them out absentmindedly, the magical bond between the two men that the cyphers have created remains eternally. This shows the deep connection of the two male characters and their fates. 16 The vain idea that external physical appearance and aesthetic appeal are reflective of a person’s inner quality is a medieval concept that also appears in Romantic texts, where it can be questioned. Eleoma Joshua discusses this trope in the context of German Romanticism through the example of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Klein Zaches, genannt Zinnober. Joshua explains that “[h]istorically, the dominant cultural voices in western literature have related social or moral degeneracy metaphorically to the imperfect body” (40; see also David T. Mitchell and Sharon L. Snyder, whom Joshua cites here). Joshua highlights “Hoffmann’s awareness of a disconnection between the sign and its meaning and the detachment of the body from its identity” (53). She further relates this to the Romantic skepticism toward ocularcentrism: “The German Romantic crisis of vision … relates to an awareness of personal distortion of reality that stems from both the destabilizing effects of introspection and selfisolation and from the physical and mental decline of the body. … In fact, the meaning of the body that is ascribed to it by the viewer tells us more about the viewer than the person being viewed” (54). The way Leonhard judges the visual appearance of his thoughts through stereotypical criteria of attractiveness tells us indeed about his judgmental character and his vain ideals at the beginning of the tale. The figures are based on his own superficial aesthetic ideals. 17 The memories of his previous thoughts confine his imagination: “Er stützte den Kopf mit den Händen und wollte gleichsam mit Gewalt etwas kluges denken; aber nur desto lebhafter mußte er sich aller dieser Gedanken erinnern, und selbst wenn er glaubte, er habe etwas neues erfunden und aufblickte, so näherte sich ihm eins der vier Kinder” (156; “He put his head in his hands and was about to try with all his might to think something clever, but then he was reminded all the more of every previous thought, and even when he believed he had created something new and looked up, one of his four offspring approached him again” [79]). 18 For a discussion of the figure of the circle in German Romanticism, see Marshall Brown’s The Shape of German Romanticism, particularly Part I on “The Romantic Circle” (25–47) and Part II on “The Open Circle” (49–126). Brown explains that “the romantic attempts to transfer the center of his existence away from the self—where it is vulnerable both morally (to pride) and metaphysically (to solipsism)—to the not-self of objective reality” (53). Leonhard’s quest for self-actualization requires him to shift his focus from the internal to the external, from himself to others and the natural environment, in order to be successful.

112  Christina M. Weiler 19 The old man explains the unproductive nature of self-centered thoughts to Leonhard: “so wie man überhaupt mit einer zu genauen Betrachtung seiner selbst nichts gewinnt, als daß man dadurch verwirrt wird” (179; “just as a person does not really achieve anything through too great introspection except great confusion” [87]). 20 Leonhard’s positive experience alone in nature resonates with Ludwig Tieck’s famous term Waldeinsamkeit, which can be roughly translated into English as “forest solitude.” This term appears in a song in Ludwig Tieck’s tale “Der blonde Eckbert” (“Fair-Haired Eckbert”) and has thus aural qualities. Leonhard’s experience of forest solitude is also aural insofar as he hears the rustling of the trees above him. The sound of the trees that envelops him triggers a switch from introspection to a focus on the natural environment, which improves the quality of his thoughts. Stefan Nienhaus points out the critique of narcissistic subjectivity in Ludwig Tieck’s works: “Die Trennung von (romantischer) Poesie und Leben ist unüberwindbar, jene existiert nur im von diesem distanzierten Kerker solipsistisch-narzisstischer Schönheit. [Ludwig] Tiecks frühromantischen Texten ist die später expliziter entwickelte Kritik an einer nurmehr in sich selbst kreisenden Subjektivität … eingeschrieben” (159; “The separation of (Romantic) poetry and life cannot be overcome; one exists only in this distanced prison of solipsistic-narcissistic beauty. The critique of a subjectivity, which is now circling around itself, which is later developed more explicitly, is inscribed in Tieck’s early Romantic texts”). In Sophie Tieck’s tale, it is possible for Leonhard to overcome his narcissistic focus on his own subjectivity and to restore lost harmony; nature serves as a catalyst for this. 21 The creative and aesthetic potential of the unconscious is also a central idea of Novalis’ “Monolog”: “Gerade das Eigenthümliche der Sprache, daß sie sich blos um sich selbst bekümmert, weiß keiner. Darum ist sie ein so wunderbares und fruchtbares Geheimniß,—daß wenn einer blos spricht, um zu sprechen, er gerade die herrlichsten, originellsten Wahrheiten ausspricht” (“Monolog” 672; “The peculiar quality of language, the fact that it is concerned only with itself, is known to no one. Language is such a marvelous and fruitful secret—because when someone speaks merely for the sake of speaking, he utters the most splendid, most original truths” [“Monologue” 83; trans. Mahony Stoljar]). 22 The negative influence of conscious reflection on aesthetic creation features prominently in Kleist’s essay “Über das Marionetten-Theater” (“On the Marionette Theater,” 1810). Similar to Leonhard, whose creation of appealing figures is impeded by conscious self-reflection, a young man in Kleist’s text is unable to reproduce a naturally gracious movement when he consciously tries to do so while looking in the mirror, and a bear fights better by instinct than someone with a rapier. As stated in Kleist’s text, “[w]ir sehen, daß in dem Maße, als, in der organischen Welt, die Reflexion dunkler und schwächer wird, die Grazie darin immer strahlender und herrschender hervortritt” (345; “We can see the degree to which contemplation becomes darker and weaker in the organic world, so that the grace that is there emerges all the more shining and triumphant” [26; trans. Neumiller]). Sophie Tieck’s fairy tale and Kleist’s “Über das Marionettentheater” thus show how conscious reflection can interfere with the instinctual and intuitive creative process, which cannot be known or willingly reproduced. Referring to Kleist’s “Über das Marionettentheater,” G.A. Wells illustrates this phenomenon: “When, for instance, the pianist plays a piece that he has learned by heart, he does not direct his fingers consciously. As soon as he becomes too conscious

Memory and Self-Reflection  113 of his movements, he is apt to go off the lines” (90). On the role of selfreflection in Kleist’s “Über das Marionettentheater,” see also Beate Allert’s chapter in this volume. 23 “In den blonden Locken des Mädchens, hing ein Kranz von frischen Rosen; als sie aufstand, hatte Leonhard bemerkt, daß eine Rose aus ihrem Haar zur Erde fiel; er näherte sich jetzt dem Sitze, welchen sie verlassen hatte, und sahe die schöne frische Knospe zu seiner Freude auf dem Boden liegen; schnell bückte er sich und hob sie auf; aber wie erstaunte er, als die Blume die noch in ihrerer höchsten Schönheit prangte, in seiner Hand sogleich verdorrte” (167–68; “A wreath of fresh roses had hung in the blond locks of the girl; when she stood up, Leonhard noticed one rose fall from her hair to the ground. He approached the chair she had vacated and to his great joy saw the lovely fresh rose on the ground. Quickly, he bent down and picked it up. But how astonished he was when the bloom, which had just shown all its resplendence, withered immediately in his hand” [83]). 24 As Susan Brantly points out in reference to E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “Der Sandmann,” “[t]he flame of poetic experience can become extinguished by the cold wind of rational analysis” (333). In Tieck’s tale, Leonhard’s old attachment to Enlightenment rationalism and introspective self-reflection has to be consumed by the flames of poetic experience in the form of love in order for him to reach self-actualization and restore harmony. 25 When Leonhard meets the young woman for the first time her blue eyes are highlighted as her gaze meets his: “Erbarmt sich denn keiner der Unglücklichen, sagte das Mädchen, und hob die blauen Augen auf zum Himmel; zugleich erblickte sie Leonhard und trat schüchtern zurück” (158; “‘Does no one take pity on this poor unfortunate woman?’ said the girl and raised her blue eyes to heaven. At the same time she caught sight of Leonhard and shyly stepped back” [79]). He later explains to the old man that he was spellbound by her gaze: “Ihr Bild begleitet mich unaufhörlich, als ihr erster Blick mich traf, wurde mein Herz auf ewig ihr Gefangener” (164; “Her vision follows me incessantly. From the moment her glance first met mine, my heart was eternally hers” [82]). Her “himmelblauen Augen” (167; “sky blue gaze” [83]) are also highlighted when he meets her again in the cave of the old man. 26 The association of the blue flower with the beloved resonates with Novalis’ blue flower in Heinrich von Ofterdingen (1802). The female figures represented by the flowers—Mathilde in Novalis’ novel fragment and the sorcerer’s daughter in Tieck’s tale—both are important for the self-actualization of the male protagonist. Dennis Mahoney points out Mathilde’s function as a catalyst for Heinrich’s poetic self-actualization: “Erst durch diese Liebe zu Mathilde reift Heinrich zum Dichter” (129; “only through this love of Mathilde, does Heinrich grow into a poet”). 27 The old man explains this to Leonhard: “Durch meine Kunst brachte ich es auch dahin, daß meine zweite Tochter sogleich dem Auge dessen entschwand, der sie wünschte, ohne sie zu lieben, weil ich sie vor einem Leben voll Elend, wie es ihrer Schwester geworden war, bewahren wollte” (177; “With all my arts, I was able to make my younger daughter invisible from any man who desired here without truly loving her, for I wanted to protect her from a life of misery such as her sister had experienced” [86]). 28 Shawn C. Jarvis and Jeannine Blackwell point out the interconnectedness of Leonhard’s quest with the fate of the old man: “Der Greis im Felsen” “reflects German Romantic interest in dreams, visions, and the protagonist’s quest to explore realms shrouded from human understanding. In the process of this quest, the young protagonist and his elderly alchemist mentor learn that the

114  Christina M. Weiler deepest understanding is gained not by achieving new intellectual heights but by restoring a lost harmony” (75). 29 As Jarvis and Blackwell emphasize, “the story maintains the traditional marriage as a happy ending and reinforces the role of the male hero in Romantic love quests” (75). In this regard, “Der Greis im Felsen” stands out among Tieck’s other works, which focus more on female protagonists and their development. Hannelore Scholz-Lübbering points this out in reference to Tieck’s novel Julie Saint Albain (published 1801): “Steht in den Romanen der männlichen Autoren der Frühromantik (z.B. Ludwig Tieck, Friedrich Schlegel, Novalis, auch Goethe) noch die Selbstfindung und Entwicklung eines zerrissenen männlichen Individuums im Mittelpunkt, das durch die Kraft der Liebe wieder zu innerer Einheit, Ruhe und Harmonie gelangt, so setzt Sophie Bernhardi die Liebe als Medium für die Entwicklung weiblicher Identitäten ein” (149; “While in the novel of male authors of early Romanticism (e.g., Ludwig Tieck, Friedrich Schlegel, Novalis, as well as Goethe) the focus is on the self-discovery and development of a torn male individual, who through the power of love reestablishes inner unity, peace, and harmony, Sophie Bernhardi uses love as a medium for the development of female identities”). Unlike in many of her other works, Tieck follows the early German Romantic structure of the male quest and the re-establishing of harmony in her tale “Der Greis im Felsen.” This is also reflected by the fact that Leonhard’s beloved does not have a name in the tale and is only referred to as his love interest or the younger daughter of the sorcerer. 30 Barbara Becker-Cantarino highlights the satirical nature of the Bambocciaden, in which “Der Greis im Felsen” was published: “Die Bambocciaden … waren ein geeignetes Mittel für die satirische Darstellung von Emotionen, für psychogene Symbolismen …, die narzisstische Konturen moderner Subjektivität enthüllen können” (41; “The Bambocciaden were a suitable means for the satirical depiction of emotions, for psychogenic symbolisms … that can reveal the narcissistic contours of modern subjectivity”). Breuer points out the satirical elements of “Der Greis im Felsen,” which he sees as typical for Sophie Tieck’s early works (29).

Works Cited Becker-Cantarino, Barbara. “Körperlichkeit und Emotion. Zu Sophie TieckBernhardis Erzählungen.” Blätter öffentlich in die Welt: Caroline de la Motte Fouqué und Sophie Tieck-Bernhardi-von Knorring. Ed. Wolfgang von Bruyn and Barbara Gribnitz. Hannover: Wehrhahn, 2011. 29–43. Bernhardi, August Ferdinand. “Vorrede.” Bambocciaden. Pt. 3. Berlin: Fredrich Maurer, 1800. 2–3. Bernhardi, August Ferdinand and Sophie Bernhardi. Reliquien: Erzählungen. Dichtungen. Ed. Hannelore Scholz-Lübbering. Munich: Golkonda, 2015. Brantly, Susan. “A Thermographic Reading of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s ‘Der Sandmann.’” The German Quarterly 55.3 (1982): 324–35. Breuer, Moses. Sophie Bernhardi geb. Tieck als romantische Dichterin. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der deutschen Romantik. Borna & Leipzig: Rober Noske, 1914. Brown, Marshall. The Shape of German Romanticism. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 1979. Bruyn, Wolfgang von and Barbara Gribnitz, eds. Blätter öffentlich in die Welt: Caroline de la Motte Fouqué und Sophie Tieck-Bernhardi-von Knorring. Hannover: Wehrhahn, 2011.

Memory and Self-Reflection  115 Campbell, Joseph. The Masks of God: Creative Mythology. London and New York: Penguin, 1968. Corkhill, Alan. “Keeping it in the Family? The Creative Collaborations of Sophie and Dorothea Tieck.” Collective Creativity: Collaborative Work in the Sciences, Literature and the Arts. Ed. Gerhard Fischer and Florian Vassen. Amsterdam & New York, NY: Rodopi, 2011. 115–28. Erll, Astrid and Ansgar Nünning. “Where Literature and Memory Met: Towards a Systematic Approach to the Concepts of Memory Used in Literary Studies.” REAL: Yearbook of Research in English and American Literature 21 (2005): 261–94. Eschler, Ewa. Sophie Tieck-Bernhardi-Knorring (1775-1833): Das Wanderleben und das vergessene Werk. Berlin: trafo, 2005. Günzel, Klaus. König der Romantik: das Leben des Dichters Ludwig Tieck in Briefen, Selbstzeugnissen und Berichten. Tübingen: Wunderlich, 1981. Haberstock, Monika. Sophie Tieck—Leben und Werk. Schreiben zwischen Rebellion und Resignation. Munich: iudicium, 2001. Hauff, Wilhelm. “Das kalte Herz.” Das kalte Herz und andere Märchen. Stuttgart: Reclam, 2000. Hoffmann, E.T.A. “Das steinerne Herz.” Sämtliche Werke in sechs Bänden: Nachtstücke. Vol. 2. Ed. Hartmut Steinecke with the collaboration of Gerhard Allroggen. Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1963. 697–725. Jarvis, Shawn C. and Jeannine Blackwell. Ed. and trans. The Queen’s Mirror: Fairy Tales by German Women, 1780-1900. London and Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 2001. Joshua, Eleoma. “Misreading the Body: E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Klein Zaches, genannt Zinnober.” Disability in German Literature, Film and Theater. Edinburgh German Yearbook 4. Ed. Eleoma Bodammer and Michael Schillmeier. Rochester: Camden House, 2010. 39–56. Kaulitz-Niedeck, Rose. “Eine Romantikerin im Baltenlande.” Baltische Monatshefte 12 (1933): 668–74. Kleist, Heinrich von. “Das Marionettentheater.” Sämtliche Werke und Briefe. Zweiter Band. Ed. Helmut Sembdner. Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 2001. 338–45. ———. “On the Marionette Theater.” Trans. Thomas Neumiller. The Drama Review: The “Puppet” Issue 16.3 (1972): 22–26. Kord, Susanne. Sich einen Namen machen: Anonymität und weibliche Autorschaft 1700-1900. Stuttgart and Weimar: Metzler, 1996. Mahoney, Dennis F. Friedrich von Hardenberg (Novalis). Stuttgart and Weimar: Metzler, 2001. Matenko, Percy, Edwin H. Zeydel, and Bertha M. Masche, ed. “(1792-1828).” Letters to and from Ludwig Tieck and His Circle: Unpublished Letters from the Period of German Romanticism Including the Unpublished Correspondence of Sophie and Ludwig Tieck. UNC Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures 57. Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1967. Mitchell, David T. and Sharon L. Snyder. Narrative Prosthesis: Disability and the Dependencies of Discourse. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 1997. Neumann, Birgit. “The Literary Representation of Memory.” Cultural Memory Studies: An International and Interdisciplinary Handbook. Ed. Astrid Erll and

116  Christina M. Weiler Ansgar Nünning. Media and Cultural Memory / Medien und kulturelle Erinnerung 8. Berlin and New York: DeGruyter, 2008. 333–43. Nienhaus, Stefan. “‘Waldeinsamkeit’: Zur Vieldeutigkeit von Tiecks erfolgreichem Neologismus.” Raumkonfigurationen in der Romantik. Ed. Walter Paper. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 2009. 151–60. Novalis. “Heinrich von Ofterdingen.” Schriften. Vol. 1. Eds. Paul Kluckhohn and Richard Samuel. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1977. ———. “Monolog.” Schriften. 2 (3rd ed., 1981): 672–73. ———. “Monologue.” Novalis. Philosophical Writings. Trans. Margaret Mahony Stoljar. Albany, NY: State U of New York P, 1997. 83–84. Scholz-Lübbering, Hannelore. “Liebe und Authentizität: Inszenierung weiblicher Liebesentwürfe in Sophie Bernhardis Roman Julie Saint Albain.” Blätter öffentlich in die Welt: Caroline de la Motte Fouqué und Sophie Tieck-Bernhardivon Knorring. Ed. Wolfgang von Bruyn and Barbara Gribnitz. Hannover: Wehrhahn, 2011. 141–62. Tieck Bernhardi von Knorring, Sophie. “Der Greis im Felsen.” Bambocciaden. Pt. 3. Berlin: Fredrich Maurer, 1800. 149–80. ———. “The Old Man in the Cave.” The Queen’s Mirror: Fairy Tales by German Women, 1780-1900. Ed. and trans. Shawn C. Jarvis and Jeannine Blackwell. London and Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 2001. 77–87. ———. Wunderbilder und Träume in elf Märchen. Ed. Hannelore Scholz. Berlin: trafo, 2000. ———. Wunderbilder und Träume. Erzählungen. Ed. Michael Holzinger. Berlin: Holzinger, 2015. Wells, G.A. “The Limitations of Knowledge: Kleist’s ‘Über das Marionettentheater.’” Modern Language Review 80.1 (1985): 90–96.

5 The Memorialization of the Aesthetic and the Aestheticization of Memory Reading the Hermit in Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen Robert E. Mottram We carry [romanticism] within ourselves as the experience of an act in which, up to a certain point, we ourselves have participated. Perhaps this obtains for every attempt at understanding the past, but it nonetheless remains the case that with romanticism we are not separated from the past by that layer of forgetfulness and that temporal opacity that could awaken in us the illusion of detachment. To interpret romanticism means quite literally to interpret the past as such, our past precisely to the extent that we are beings who want to be defined and, as such, interpreted in relation to a totality of experiences that slip into the past. Paul de Man (The Rhetoric of Romanticism 50)

5.1 The Aesthetic as Ideology, Critique, and Performance The challenge posed by Paul de Man as both an affront and a summons to the interpretation of romanticism is so formidable and inescapable because it confronts the belated critic with the impossibility and necessity of critique, a dilemma thematized in the very texts most persistently ordered under the period term “romanticism.” The basis of his challenge is the insight that romanticism is opaque to the understanding precisely to the extent that performance and cognition, act and interpretation, remain impenetrable to each other.1 Such discontinuities define Kant’s critical philosophy—as it seeks in the aesthetic a bridge between epistemology and ethics—as much as literary theory, insofar as literature rests on and registers the potential incompatibility between “what language means (das Gemeinte) and the manner in which it produces meaning (die Art des Meinens).”2 This insight owes its critical force as much to romantic texts as to their belated critiques. Whichever critical lens may constitute one’s memory of romanticism—if memory it is—none of the terms in this constellation (critique, romanticism, and memory) can escape their imbrication in the linguistic problematic at issue. For both romanticism and its critical reception, across a wide variety of theoretical lenses, DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-8

118  Robert E. Mottram necessarily reproduce the dissymmetry between events and their integration into stable structures of meaning. Friedrich von Hardenberg (1772–1801), the early German romantic poet and theorist who wrote under the penname Novalis, famously located the problem in the incongruence between linguistic and human desires. Gerade das Eigenthümliche der Sprache, daß sie sich blos um sich selbst bekümmert, weiß keiner. Darum ist sie ein so wunderbares und fruchtbares Geheimniß—daß wenn einer blos spricht, um zu sprechen, er gerade die herrlichsten, originellsten Wahrheiten ausspricht. Will er aber von etwas Bestimmten sprechen, so läßt ihn die launige Sprache das lächerlichste und verkehrteste Zeug sagen. (2:438) It is precisely the most essential aspect of language—that it is merely occupied with itself—that nobody knows. That is why it is such a wonderful and fruitful mystery—since when one merely speaks, just for the sake of speaking, one expresses the most magnificent and original truths. But if one wants to speak about something definite, fickle language will cause one to say the most ridiculous and confused stuff. (translation mine) Novalis severs epistemology from rhetoric at the moment of intention. In desiring to say something definite, one overlooks what “nobody knows”—namely, that language does not readily bow to external determination. This has proven particularly useful in critiquing critiques of ideologies purported to be specifically “romantic.” To attempt to affix romanticism on a definite historical, ideological, or cultural plane is to risk looking confused and being mastered by the texts one aspires to master.3 In a similar vein, Thomas Pfau has pointed out how cultural and materialist critiques of romantic ideology frequently repeat the epistemological paradigm and utopian aspirations constitutive of the (early) romantic narratives against which they are directed: “that of forms conspiring against their belated discernment” and “that of an absolute evaluation of the other performed from a putatively value-free and clairvoyant position” (“Introduction” 4). Frequently basing its methodological authority on some moral charge against its object, such criticism claims that “the period’s subtle, figural idioms were fundamentally aimed at aestheticizing the period’s political, gendered, and economic antagonisms, thereby effectively preempting any possible consciousness of those antagonisms” (Pfau, “Introduction” 3). That the ideological critique, whose purported definite grasp on the past is marshaled in order to redeem a political praxis from a self-effacing aestheticization, could so readily turn out to be itself ideology is an outgrowth of the concept it decries: the aesthetic. Part of the act to be interpreted—repetitions in the guise of

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  119 redemption—critiques of romantic ideology, in their inability to say what they intend, expose themselves to the confusion of Novalis’ determined rhetorician, but they are far from ridiculous. They lead one to examine more closely the status of the aesthetic in romantic texts, a problematic that to neglect would be to risk forgetting the impact that makes romanticism both memorable and intractable. The aesthetic in the wake of Kant accommodates ideology and critique, as well as the seductions that allow the former to appear as the latter and vice versa. Schiller distills the crucial elements of aesthetic ideology when, in the second letter of his Aesthetic Education, he writes that “um jenes politische Problem in der Erfahrung zu lösen, [muß man] durch das ästhetische den Weg nehmen …, weil es die Schönheit ist, durch welche man zu der Freyheit wandert” (Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen 11; “if man is ever to solve that problem of politics in practice he will have to approach it through the problem of the aesthetic, because it is only through Beauty that man makes his way to Freedom” [On the Aesthetic Education of Man 9]). Undergirding this expression of faith in a certain kind of pedagogical program is a teleological commonplace, of which readers of Walter Benjamin are justly wary, even though its appellation as an “aestheticization of politics” is somewhat unjust.4 It is the aesthetic that, following Redfield, invents autonomy as the condition of the artwork, and disinterestedness as the condition of the perception of the artwork, it also defines art as the sign of the human, the human as the producer of itself, and history as the ongoing work of art that is humanity. (11) However, it is for good reason that Deborah Elise White cautions that “a meaningful … politics may not be possible without aestheticization” (4). For the aesthetic “enables a critical and reflexive articulation of the historical passage between knowledge and action, epistemology and ethics, fine art and politics” (4, 3). Always too near to be, as Terry Eagleton would have it, a space “conveniently sequestered from all other social practice” (9), the aesthetic makes possible the crossings between theory and praxis, text and context, that allows one to articulate distant possibilities. Bearing witness to this mere fact is the provenance of the aesthetic in the two most consequential critical philosophies dealing with the subject—those of Kant and Hegel—which occupy themselves with aesthetics not because their authors harbored a deep appreciation for the arts, but because it was imposed on them from the rigor of their own attempts to ground pure and practical reason, absolute and objective spirit. Since, therefore, the aesthetic “critically examines the possibility and the modalities of political discourse and political action,” since “it is epistemological as well as political through and through,” the passage through the aesthetic

120  Robert E. Mottram is as critical to establishing meaning and value as it is of displaying all the fickleness that Novalis sees in the autonomous potential of language (Aesthetic Ideology 106).5 It is the stuff of ideology as well as critique. Forest “Tres” Pyle draws out the implications of that fundamental instability when he writes that “if the aesthetic can be imagined, projected, incorporated as a ‘bridge’ or vehicle or medium toward something else— political liberation, erotic love, ethical regard, God’s grace—aestheticism always poses the risk of disrupting that articulation or foreclosing that trajectory” (6). Prima facie, Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen thematizes all of the goals enumerated by Pyle at different points in its espousal of an aestheticism: the gradual recognition of Poesie as the arch-romantic transcendental signifier of creative consciousness in a narrative ostensibly about the education of a poet. This is the Novalis of the blue flower, the poet of a Bildung that perfectly conforms to Redfield’s description above.6 It is the Novalis familiar to the literary historical survey courses of the institutional humanities, itself an outgrowth of a profoundly Schillerian vision.7 Heinrich’s encounter with the hermit in the novel’s central chapter presents a particularly rich concatenation of concern with “political liberation, erotic love, ethical regard, [and] God’s grace.” It is also the most spectacularly self-reflexive section of the novel, in which Heinrich is uncannily drawn to a book in the hermit’s subterranean library written in a foreign script and said to be the story “von den wunderbaren Schicksalen eines Dichters” (1:313; “of the wondrous fortunes of a poet” [Henry von Ofterdingen 91]) in whose images Heinrich gradually recognizes his own past and future.8 That the hermit’s book cannot help but refer to the empirical Heinrich von Ofterdingen—the book held in the reader’s hands—is a fitting reminder of how texts, in referring at once to themselves as well as to something else, perform the incessant crossings between text and context where the category of the aesthetic was made to fit. Rather than interpreting such instances of hyper self-reflexivity as either the point of dissemination of a romantic ideology onto the text’s purported exterior, or, conversely, as the relativization and therefore implicit critique of the text’s grasp on the material life outside it (as if to say “this is only a book”), the performance of the text as it folds back on itself contains a much stronger critical charge. In examining a text’s performative dimension—“not only what a text says or even how it says it, but what it does” (White 8)—one confronts the articulating potential of the aesthetic as it is made to disarticulate its own ends. Splayed and incessantly reproducing the dissymmetry between act and interpretation, the performative dimension of texts memorializes the aesthetic as a problem even when, as is the case with the hermit episode in Heinrich von Ofterdingen, it occurs as and against the aestheticization of memory. For memory in Heinrich von Ofterdingen is the thematic field on which the aesthetic (dis)articulates the passage between act and interpretation,

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  121 performance and cognition, the material and the transcendental. Whatever its degree of psychological verisimilitude, memory in Ofterdingen is as much a matter of inscription as description. The discursive relation to the past established in the novel incessantly outstrips attempts both to ground the subject in a stable temporal horizon and temporality in a stable subject. It is by virtue of this disarticulation that reading appears as an uncertain yet necessary synonym for the possibility of encountering a romanticism that refuses to be superseded, buried, or otherwise obscured from the exigencies of the present.

5.2 History as Aesthetic Experience In a novel whose enduring trope—the blue flower—eventually reveals itself to be a forget-me-not, discourses on one’s relation to the past are of pivotal importance.9 The hermit’s reflections on memory and history demonstrate, in an openly manifest as well as subterranean fashion, that discourse on memory, whether individual or cultural, must come to terms with memory as discourse. This is part of the lesson that the hermit imparts to Heinrich after having lured him and his spelunking guide, an old miner, into the vaulted chambers of his cavernous dwelling. Upon suddenly hearing a voice singing in the distance, Heinrich and the miner follow the sound deeper into the cave and discover a hermit hunched over a large book, described as bearing no mark of time and possessing a gaze of “unaussprechliche Heiterkeit, als sähe er von einem hellen Berge in einen unendlichen Frühling hinein” (1:30; “inexpressible serenity as though he were looking from a sunlit mountain into an endless springtime” [Novalis 80]). That the troglodyte is both out of time and, given his boundless regard, conspicuously out of place helps soften the impact of the misalignment between the dialogue on history, with which the hermit engages the miner, and the novel’s diegetic temporal frame, the thirteenth century. Historians must by necessity also be poets, so goes his lesson, because “was erst die Geschichte zur Geschichte macht” (“that which makes history into [H]istory”) is the organization of seemingly contingent events “zu einem angenehmen und lehrreichen Ganzen” (“into a pleasant and instructive whole”) regardless of the empirical verifiability of the events or even the existence of the personages involved (1:306; Novalis 85 [translation modified]). Poetry must complete history so that text can be harmoniously integrated into context. At interest here is not only the relative merits or dangers of an historicism that “makes history come alive” but the dissonance between an inhabitant of the Middle Ages and his espousal of an eighteenth-century concept of history: that of history as a collective singular—History as such (Geschichte)—rather than one of several reports (Historie), “account[s] of what occurred” (Koselleck 32). Historicism is presented ahistorically as a superimposition of premodern and modern.

122  Robert E. Mottram This undisguised celebration of the mediating function of the aesthetic in the interest of Bildung is perhaps one reason to impart to the inexpressibly serene hermit a degree of cunning and calculation, as have several other readers.10 Like the duplicity of the aesthetic that—somewhere between knowledge and action—can (dis)figure the (dis)articulations to which it is consigned, the hermit’s discourse is subject to the delicate play of revelation and concealment used to authenticate History as and for human progress. This is especially evident when the hermit and the miner engage in their pathos-ridden dialogue and thereby put theory into practice. With breathtaking semantic density and temporal scope, they chart the gradual tempering of an all-encompassing primordial violence along an axis of infinite humanization. The sedimentations of the cave and the skeletal remains of bygone ages strewn about it provide access to the future slumbering in the most distant past: Wenn ich die seltsamen Knochen ansehe, die hier in so gewaltiger Menge versammelt sind; wenn ich mir die wilde Zeit denke, wo diese fremdartigen, ungeheuren Thiere in dichten Schaaren sich in diese Höhlen hineindrängten, von Furcht und Angst vielleicht getrieben, und hier ihren Tod fanden; wenn ich dann wieder bis zu den Zeiten hinaufsteige, wo diese Höhlen zusammenwuchsen und ungeheure Fluten das Land bedeckten: so komme ich mir selbst wie ein Traum der Zukunft, wie ein Kind des ewigen Friedens vor. (1:308) Whenever I look at the strange old bones found here in such great abundance, whenever I think of the wild era in which these strange, monstrous animals, perhaps driven by fear and anguish, crowded into these caves in big droves and met their death here, and whenever I go back again to the times in which these caves grew together and vast floods covered the lands, then I seem to myself like a dream of the future, like a child of eternal peace. (Novalis 87) The imaginative reconstruction of one contingent event returns to banish contingency. Humanitarian totalization, ever hard to separate from totalitarian humanism, is called upon to continue its work of infinite perfectibility as future and past meet in the dream, a dream that absorbs the audience of this dialogic performance.11 Heinrich, the ideal disinterested spectator, succumbs completely: “Wie lange Jahre lagen die eben vergangenen Stunden hinter ihm, und er glaubte nie anders gedacht und empfunden zu haben” (1:311; “The hours just gone by lay behind him like long years, and he imagined he never had thought and felt otherwise” [Novalis 90]). While Heinrich’s rapture is calibrated more to a work of

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  123 art than to a history lesson, he all-too-perfectly receives the hermit’s lesson of History—a totality admitting nothing outside of itself and modeled in opposition to the subjective interests of individual spectators. If Heinrich’s ecstasy readily assimilates itself to the potential dictates of a romantic art religion, the hermit’s evocation of historical redemption— with the promise of happiness one invariably associates with the phrase “dream of the future”—nevertheless unfolds a more elaborate if not overwrought weave of history and aestheticism.12 The proximity of Heinrich’s aesthetic experience to the instruction of History easily appears as a solution to, rather than the articulation of, a problem: the fleeting continuity between sensuous apprehension and the conceptual formalization that would meet the requirements of cognition—between the senses and sense. For at the precise moment that the hermit most emphatically positions himself in relation to the past, his utterance buckles under the pressure of the very mechanism that enables it. In exclaiming to feel “like a dream of the future,” for example, the hermit braids together two incommensurable temporal registers as the genitive uneasily straddles its subjective and objective poles. On the one hand, the past provides the anchor point from which radiates a dream that finds its fulfillment in the hermit. History unfolds continuously under the even illumination of teleology as the dream slumbering in the past awaits its future realization in the present of the hermit. On the other hand, the “dream of the future” is a future’s dream anchored in the hermit’s present and belatedly projected onto the past. Instead of continuous and teleological, this temporal structure is discontinuous and metaleptic. The past disappears in its appearance as a tyrannical present takes itself as the effect for that which it can only ever be the cause. That the hermit’s attempt to position himself in relation to the past should prove a paradoxical task is unsurprising, repeating as it does the aspirations of Kant’s aesthetic reflective judgment—a “sleight of hand” that, following Redfield, “claims simultaneously to produce and to discover the essential harmony of the perceiving mind and the perceived world, sensation and idea, phenomenality and cognition” (11). Splayed temporally between a teleological and metaleptic structure, conceptually between the singular event and the universal validity to which it is ascribed, and rhetorically between the performative utterance and its recuperation in a system of cognition, the hermit configures the conditions of the pathos to which he accedes in the stutteringly reflexive eloquence of the “then-I-seem-to-myself-like.”

5.3 The Imposition of the Present Referential readings of this passage cannot help but neglect how aesthetic constructs are out of synch with their construction. This fundamental duplicity of the aesthetic manifest in the hermit’s theory and praxis of historicization upends what is often interpreted as the symbolic

124  Robert E. Mottram role of the hermit in the broader context of Heinrich von Ofterdingen. Hans Blumenberg, for example, sums up the hermit’s function in a single epithet: he is the “Hüter der memoria” (552; “guardian of memory” [translation mine]). Blumenberg is referring to the “alexandrine basis” of Novalis’ cave, where self-discovery must proceed through the examination of a past, the superiority of which is assumed.13 The hermit does indeed possess a collection of antiquities. In addition to his library, housing the book that so fascinates Heinrich, he retains a full suit of armor from his days as a youthful Crusader. This latter object points to a different valence of the hermit. For the hermit is not merely the neutral guardian of memory: however unwittingly, he is also its wielder. His theory of the supplementary function of poetry in historical narrative produces a totality—History as such—that is “pleasant and instructive” only to the extent that it is engrossing and possessive: “[Heinrich] imagined he never had thought and felt otherwise” (Novalis 90). Subsuming past and future in a teleological narrative of domestication, the hermit’s effect on Heinrich discloses the proximity of enthralling and ensnaring, of captivating and capturing. The hermit is more than the custodian of the archive nested away from the course of the world. One would do violence to his theory of how history becomes History without recognizing this second valence of the hermit’s relationship to the past: that, irrespective of the claims it may have on empirical truth, it can be orchestrated to violently seize the present. Moreover, since the teleological temporal structure that situates the hermit at the culmination of a process of domestication is inseparable from its metaleptic shadow structure, the “memory” wielded to such wondrous effect is just as surely a function of oblivion. Here, aesthetic production is mirrored in its product. Much as the hermit causes the past to disappear in its appearance, Heinrich is made to forget everything—everything except for the aesthetic experience itself. In contradistinction to other epiphanic moments in the novel, Heinrich’s enchantment upon listening to the hermit allows for no easy assimilation to the recuperative gesture of déjà vu, the intimation that a more authentic ground undergirds subjective experience.14 Thomas Pfau, on the other hand, describes déjà vu in Ofterdingen as one manifestation of “romantic rhythm”—moments of “serendipitous, albeit inconclusive, insight stimulating its subject to emotional or cognitive advance, albeit without any further possibility of being authenticated and consolidated as genuine knowledge” (Romantic Moods 62). It is still conspicuous that this particular moment is staged emphatically in opposition to remembrance. The sense of having been there or having felt this before is strangely absent. It is rather a moment of oblivion. While déjà vu is the master trope of the event-character of memory, the master trope of oblivion as an event is, at least since Homer’s Odyssey, aesthetic experience itself. The former has affinities with mémoire involuntaire, that which imposes

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  125 itself on the subject and signals the return of a more authentic temporal ground beneath everyday experience.15 The latter is rather an imposition of the present—one that is indifferent to the constancy of any experience that has managed, whether through concentrated effort or by the designs of an active forgetting (in the Nietzschean sense), to preserve itself in the face of a potentially disfiguring “now.”16 The difference between involuntary memory and a tyrannical present is the subject of an aphorism in Theodor Adorno’s Minima Moralia, in which he dismisses as a mere “sentimental consolation” a claim he attributes to Jean Paul that “memories are the only possessions which no-one can take away from us” (166). In terms that bear directly on the hermit— who asserts that he withdrew from the world not to flee it, but in order to “carry on [his] contemplations undisturbed” and whose “countless memories are entertaining company” (Novalis, 81, 83; “ungestört meinen Betrachtungen nachhängen” [1:302], “zahllosen Erinnerungen sind eine unterhaltende Gesellschaft” [1:304])—Adorno diagnoses the hypostatization of past life as renunciation taken for fulfillment and the guardianship of memoria as the very antithesis of memory: Precisely where [memories] become controllable and objectified, where the subject believes himself entirely sure of them, memories fade like delicate wallpapers in bright sunlight. But where, protected by oblivion, they keep their strength, they are endangered like all that is alive. (Minima Moralia 166) Here, as in Horkheimer and Adorno’s monumental reading of Odysseus’ encounter with the Sirens in Homer, memory has an affinity with aesthetic experience. In their account, the proto-typical bourgeois subject resists yielding to the Sirens’ song through a cunning arrangement that shackles self-assertion to self-renunciation. Bound to the mast by oarsmen whose ears are stuffed with wax, Odysseus, “like a prisoner present at a concert” can sail safely past as his “spirited call for liberation fades like applause” (Horkheimer and Adorno 34). This contrivance, constitutive of the discourse of civilization itself, on which “fulfillment shines forth perpetually” only as “devitalized beauty,” bears on the hermit’s appeal to “a dream of the future” which, only able to assert itself through self-negation, is fated to become another of the countless memories that keep him merely entertained (Horkheimer and Adorno 33). While for the mature Odysseus, as for the hermit, “only perpetual presence of mind forces an existence from nature,” the protean Heinrich by contrast is vulnerable not only to impositions of the past—whether as déjà vu or involuntary memory—but to the very “perpetual presence,” the mastery of which would invalidate the past (Horkheimer and Adorno 33). Adorno continues:

126  Robert E. Mottram Just as no earlier experience is real that has not been loosed by involuntary remembrance from the deathly fixity of its isolated existence, so conversely, no memory is guaranteed, existent in itself, indifferent to the future of him who harbours it; nothing past is proof, through its translation into mere imagination [durch den Übergang in die bloße Vorstellung], against the curse of the empirical present. The most blissful memory of a person can be revoked in its very substance by later experience. He who has loved and who betrays that love does harm not only to the image of the past, but to the past itself. (Adorno, Minima Moralia 166; Gesammelte Schriften, 4:189) The same channel that allows the past “in its very substance” to erupt into the present exposes it to the contingencies of “the curse of the empirical present” against which “the image of the past”—the one not “loosed by involuntary remembrance from the deathly fixity of its isolated existence”—acts as a bulwark. If the image of the past unfolds in irreversible fashion, the past itself folds back and forth interminably; it can be touched by the present at any point. Memory manifests itself here as the intractable double-bind of a constancy that the subject, in possessing it, does not possess and a contingency that possesses the subject as both the promise of and threat to its constancy. The event-character of memory provides for both the articulation and disarticulation of an authentic temporal horizon. Moreover, since this reflection on memory is also mired in the historicity of its self-reflection, Adorno’s cautionary tale of re-membering and demembering cannot help but itself be vulnerable to “the curse of the empirical present” to which it refers. For at the very moment Adorno would convincingly describe the vulnerability of a determinate past “through its translation into mere imagination,” his language succumbs to an underdeterminability that can no longer be called mere. Indeed, the word “mere” gives off an unexpected critical spark as the passage from the past to “bloße Vorstellung” (“mere imagination”) stalls with every word meant to invest that passage with substance. Both in the original and in translation, the phrase “durch den Übergang in die bloße Vorstellung” (“through its translation into mere imagination”) could be rendered as “through the through into the mere through.” Although somewhat imaginative, this deadlock on what should have been an open door repeats the potential of the aesthetic (for which “imagination” is a romantic synonym) to unhinge the discourses it manages to unlock.17 Never entirely naked (“bloß”) and therefore never merely mere, the imagination—here appearing as the translation of Vorstellung—can attempt to present (“vorstellen”) and conceive (“vorstellen”) its own idea (“Vorstellung”), but is constantly also the performance (“Vorstellung”) of its dissolution into something one can no longer properly call “bloße Vorstellung.” Adorno’s account of the interplay between memory and oblivion is not limited to individual experience, with which one, due to some level of

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  127 psychological verisimilitude, can likely identify. As its contextualization with the historicizing gestures of the hermit should make clear, it also has methodological ramifications—namely, those involving how a text is paired with a context. In addition to warning against freezing a text in history in positivistic fashion, causing both to fade, Adorno also warns that the passage enabling the past to forcefully assert itself into the present makes the past not only vulnerable to recall but to revocation. This “field of tension,” as Adorno calls it in a related aphorism, is where the event-character of texts can be engaged (Minima Moralia 127). Texts that refer simultaneously to themselves as well as outside, ones that therefore elicit the cross between intrinsic and extrinsic modes of criticism, harbor imminent critiques of the aesthetic ideologies they produce. This gap between performance and belated interpretation splinters the hermit’s (ahistorical) historicism into irreconcilable temporal modes; turns his humanist lesson into a scene of (self-)persuasion; stages Heinrich’s reception of that lesson as the imposition of an all-consuming and memoryrevoking aestheticism; and reduces eloquence to a stutter. The hermit’s song, that which lured Heinrich deeper into the cave in the first place, stages a particularly seductive performance. If the virtue of the idea of performativity is, following Jonathan Culler, that “of foregrounding language as an act rather than a representation” (Theory of the Lyric 131), performativity is nevertheless geared toward complexities rather than their transcendence: “it draws attention to the difficulty of what can be said to happen, under what conditions, and to the fact that the event is not something simply given” (“Deconstruction and the Lyric” 43). The song of the hermit, another stress point in relation to the gap between performance and representation, is animated through the subtlest impositions of the present—a present that, braiding memory and oblivion, history and hope, must constantly (re)present itself in accordance with the critical force unleashed whenever the hypostatization of the past confronts the act of hypostatization. In surprising fashion, it bears witness to the mnemonic device that guarantees that the hermit, that self-named “child of eternal peace,” will dream of a future ceaselessly deferred because it echoes a tormenting problem—call it “romantic”— that is only possible to forget, not to transcend.

5.4 Singing the Lyric, Reading Inscription “[T]o sing, in the romantic sense is this: fantasmatically to enjoy my unified body” (Barthes 288). Such is Roland Barthes’ formulation of how the Lied, or art song, encloses the singer in a somatic space. In songs whose master trope is that of a lover gazing into the eyes of a beloved, the body is the reverberating chamber of subjectivity as such. For Barthes translates into the affective sphere the discursive space forged by the early poetry of Goethe, who, having foraged for tropes from the prelapsarian world of the

128  Robert E. Mottram idyll, staged transcendental subjectivity as a specular moment between lovers.18 The insular world of the idyll establishes its plush gardens and intimate pleasures in opposition to the coarser differentiations of the civilizing process. In accordance with this tradition, Barthes’ conception of romantic song banishes the dynamism of socio-historical experience, negating distinctions of social role and gender. Romantic song “abolishes voices” but not “the voice” (Barthes 287). The performance space, whether a drawing room, salon, or modern music hall, is likewise merely the historically contingent venue of an internal upheaval. The empirical body singing becomes the total body of the transcendental song: it is “everything that resounds in me, frightens me, or makes me desire” (Barthes 289). Novalis’ hermit, whose ascetic withdrawal into the interior appeals to the transcendental order that would shelter both earth and subject, sings a song of otherworldly intercourse memorializing the experiences that stamped the contingencies of becoming with the security of being: Gern verweil’ ich noch im Thale Lächelnd in der tiefen Nacht, Denn der Liebe volle Schaale Wird mir täglich dargebracht. Ihre heiligen Tropfen heben Meine Seele hoch empor, Und ich steh in diesem Leben Trunken an des Himmels Thor. Eingewiegt in seelges Schauen Ängstigt mein Gemüth kein Schmerz. O! die Königinn der Frauen Giebt mir ihr getreues Herz. Bangverweinte Jahre haben Diesen schlechten Thon verklärt, Und ein Bild ihm eingegraben, Das ihm Ewigkeit gewährt. Jene lange Zahl von Tagen Dünkt mir nur ein Augenblick; Werd ich einst von hier getragen Schau ich dankbar noch zurück. (1:301) Glad I dwell beneath the mountains Smiling in the darkest night; Here of love are many fountains Flowing daily free and bright.

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  129 And her holy waters lift me With my thirsting soul on high, Where, though still in life, I drift me, Drunken, heaven’s portals nigh. Cradled there in adoration Never dread can smite my soul; Mother queen of every nation, Make my heart all pure and whole. Years by sorrow sped and craven, Glorified this humble clay And thereon a seal have graven, Whence eternity always. Now the tale of years I’ve tarried Seems the twinkling of an eye; When one day from here I’m carried, I’ll look backward gratefully. (Novalis 79–80) The hermit fantasmatically enjoys his unified body in a song in which troglodytic and celestial existence benefit from a harmonious correspondence. The mediation between nether and heavenly spheres is given symbolic form in “der Liebe volle Schaale” (“the bowl full of love”).19 Donated daily from the “Königin der Frauen” (“Queen of Women”) the bowl grounds the tropological exchange between sub- and supra-terranean realms in a material form. Likewise, the love that must pass from the ideal to the real takes the form of “holy drops” (“heilige Tropfen”)— itself a formulation that abbreviates the course charted from divine essence to material appearance. The point of tangency between above and below finds its corollary in the temporal dilation that casts the elderly hermit—“heaven’s portals nigh”—as a child “cradled in adoration” whose entire life’s course seems but a “twinkling of an eye.” Secure from bygone years of sorrow, the hermit nestled in his cave shares the closed economy of a child in a maternal embrace.20 All that remains of these more troubling times—“Bangverweinte Jahre” (literally, “anxiety-ridden years cried away”)—is “an inscription” (“ein Bild”) on the wall of the cave “granting it eternity” (“ihm Ewigkeit gewähren”). The gesture whereby becoming is inscribed within a more secure sphere of being reciprocates the top-down directionality of the bowls of love by a bottom-up alchemy that enables the hermit to glorify humble clay. The circuit between the worldly and otherworldly is as sure as the proportionality between memory and oblivion that allows the hermit to live out his remaining days unencumbered by past or future anxieties. The romantic

130  Robert E. Mottram song fulfills its promise of unity as the cave reverberates with the deep, spiritual harmony of the transcendental voice. This interpretation of the hermit’s song in terms of the harmony of the transcendental voice—the traditional reading—is tautological. It restates the ideology that the lyric voice projects. David Wellbery succinctly describes this ideology, having written that the lyric “is the cultural-discursive site in which the transcendental voice—as language prior to language, as the origin of subjectivity within the maternal matrix—is rendered imaginatively accessible” (206). The translator’s rendering of “Königinn der Frauen” in the third stanza as “Mother queen” is therefore quite apt, tending as it does toward the “anamnesic potential” that, according to Wellbery, the lyric seeks to actualize by stimulating the “resonant traces of childhood impressions” (195). Friedrich Kittler historicized such impressions and their relation to the transcendental voice’s maternal matrix in terms of a specific social practice: learning to read around 1800. Whereas children were previously taught to read by their fathers, mothers taught the romantic generation.21 This had a profound effect on memory because [a]n alphabetization in which all real work was taken on by the mother ceased to be an incision or pain; the latter, the forceable violation required to mark human beings with a storage or memory capacity, had always been forgotten because it was the precondition of memory itself. The discourse network of 1800 reversed this and made possible memories that reached back to a fully affectionate, maternal alphabetization. (Kittler 51) The mother, in addition to teaching children how to read, “taught that her gift of love was unforgettable”—a lesson that would console one Friedrich Hempel, an insomniac judge cited by Kittler, who appealed to his “beloved ABC book” to alleviate his guilt in having to condemn whomever the law deemed guilty: “You healed the sufferings of my soul with the balm you poured from the nectar cup of memory! I wandered through the paradisiacal meadow of my springtime and was seized with a longing like the thought of a lost lover” (52). Hempel’s “nectar cup” calls on the same metaphoric register as the hermit’s bowl of love in recalling a maternal origin sheltered from the brutal exigencies of Nietzschean mnemotechnics.22 The judge’s rather comical artifice of expression bears witness to how the rhetorical flourishes of the idyll were marshaled by the lyric, which, concealing its artificiality behind a myth of authenticity, came to harbor subjectivity as such. Tuned to this key, the hermit’s song participates in the chorus of memory and oblivion that makes the mother the painless object of the former by virtue of being the guarantor of the latter. Part of a broad social regimen that allowed labor

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  131 to be rediscovered as nature, the lyric, as it morphed out of the idyll, beckoned readers “into and through the language of the poem in quest of their most intimate subjectivity” (Wellbery 18). It sought to be a temptation rather than a technique, a rendezvous rather than a routine, a call rather than a cut. The hermit’s song both conforms to the myth of lyric subjectivity, as well as harbors its own critique of that ideology. Manifesting the duplicities of the aesthetic as it seeks to reconcile cognitive and sensory spheres while tracing the contours of their separation, the song splinters at precisely those moments where the ideal and the material come into contact—when the hermit receives “der Liebe volle Schaale” and when an image of eternity is inscribed in clay. This occurs when lyric song is made to confront the reading body. According to Barthes, romantic song “originates in the heart of a finite, collected, centered, intimate, familiar site”: “the singer’s—and hence the listener’s—body” (Barthes 288). However intertwined one conceives the relation of text and body, there is clearly a difference between singing and reading; and the hermit’s song, appearing as it does in a novel, is not sung. It is read, and most likely read silently.23 In contradistinction to Barthes’ collected, centered, familiar intimacy, the body in the act of reading has the potential of decentering, defamiliarizing, and dispersing the logic that embraces production and reception— singer and listener; author, text, and reader—in a myth of shared intimacy. Whereas the lyric voice reanimates the idea of transcendental subjectivity in text and song, the voice engendered when the reading body makes contact with the written text—the overtones of writing—can function centrifugally rather than centripetally. For Garret Stewart, whose project of “phonemic reading” finds both legitimation and inspiration in Novalis’ text, it is the “modern subject-position of the reader, adrift amidst a constant play of signifiers” amplifying “the continual confrontation, within writing, of the phonic and the graphic” and “the continually returning challenge of sound to sense” (Stewart 64, 24, 25). To read the hermit’s song phenomically is to (s)train the ear to hear the dissonance between the material and the transcendental rather than their harmony. The song’s staging of the antagonism between phonic and graphic registers forms the mode of its self-critique and reading it with an ear for synchronic overtones has paradigmatic consequences. For at precisely the points where script grounds song in the harmony of the lyric—“the bowl full of love” in the second stanza and the inscription in clay in the fourth—sound unearths the technique that is the lyric’s (maternal) function to forget. These exchanges that materialize the transcendental and glorify the empirical betray an auditory excess threatening the economy they otherwise serve to close. One cannot read “der Liebe volle Schaale” without also hearing Schall: German for “sound.” Similarly, one cannot help but hear “tone” when reading “Thon” (German for “clay” as well as “tone”). Here, homophonic polysemy takes on the character of semantic

132  Robert E. Mottram sedimentation, wherein one word over another is also one word as the other: the other of the lyric. Invading the lyric harmony between above and below is a semantic dissonance that in the fourth stanza substitutes the song itself, the tones sung by the hermit, for the humble clay—the former disfiguring the transfiguration of the latter. Now it is the song itself that has been sculpted throughout years of sorrow, and its graven image (“ein Bild ihm eingegraben”) is part of the imaginary conceit (“sich einbilden”; “to imagine something”) that takes the soothing power of melody for transcendental commerce. With the lines of communication between above and below severed, the hermit’s asceticism reveals itself in its urgency. He is no longer “cradled there in adoration” by the “Mother queen,” but rather cradles himself through his “daily” routine of singing. Accordingly, the expression of fulfillment spilling over the eleventh into the twelfth verse, “the queen of women / Gives me her faithful heart,” turns into a desperate plea: “Give me” (“Giebt mir”).24 Singing daily the same song, a tongue-lashing honed to the requirements of his anxiety, the hermit can only celebrate his unified body—in communion with the transcendental sphere—by recalling the rupture (the absence of transcendental commerce) that necessitated the song in the first place. From divinely inspired aesthete to frenzied ascetic, Novalis’ singing recluse could be said to dramatize, on a thematic-psychological level, the memory and forgetting of the technique whereby he is able to fashion himself as “a child of eternal peace.” In this case, the critical reading, in which the rote repetition of singing inscribes a “memory” of transcendental provenance, would demystify the traditional one—the ideology of the lyric voice. To stop here is simply to repeat the mapping of discovery onto production, that which undergirds the hermit’s philosophy of history as well as Kant’s aesthetic judgment and which makes critiques of aesthetic ideology part and parcel of the ideology they claim to critique. In creating a context for itself, the song, as it bifurcates into illusion and explanation, would serve to legitimate the function of the aesthetic: closing off the text in a meaningful network as total as its plays of substitution will allow. On a theoretical plane less bound to representational, theme-based interpretations, the hermit comes to figure the self-resistance of the aesthetic to the narratives it sutures out of the heterogeneous registers of performance and cognition. Allegorizing the gap between act and interpretation, the hermit’s song produces a coherent and meaningful temporal sequence—its narrative of demystification—but only through the random imposition of sense onto sound. If the phonotextual excess that warps the formal integrity of both bowl and clay is to mark the jagged contours of the economy it serves to patch as well as puncture, then the performative dimension of the song—the fraught passage between meaning and its contingent generation—must command as much attention as its inevitable integration into structures of meaning, whether they be grounded in discourses of history, anthropology, or psychology as they

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  133 appear in the hermit’s historicist dialogue, Barthes’ physiological reading of the lyric, or in the anxiety-ridden overtones of the hermit’s song, respectively. As long as the discourse of memory and romanticism, as well as its concomitant memory of romanticism, includes a critical examination of memory as discourse, it will be difficult to say that romanticism is something past and gone; and this for the frustrating reason that acts and interpretations—with all their power to institutionalize and memorialize—are underwritten by, and find their vulnerabilities in, acts of reading attenuated to the level of and’s, of’s, and as’. Such linkages and (mis-) appropriations—both syntagmatic and paradigmatic—will keep readers reencountering Novalis’ hermit over and over in order to tarry with the aesthetic duplicities used to combine acts of readings with the bridge of the “in order to.” As readings build up the sedimentations of the hermit’s discursive domain, one may have occasion to contemplate the skeletons of past ideas and the ingenuity that allowed some to flow together. Part of this contemplation is the wonder that, like a voice singing in the distance, lures us ever further on only to find someone, like Heinrich finds the hermit, hunched over a book reading.

Notes 1 As de Man specifies in his essay “Wordsworth and Hölderlin,” “the interpretation of romanticism remains for us the most difficult and at the same time the most necessary of tasks” because “it is precisely this experience of the temporal relation between the act and its interpretation that is one of the main themes of romantic poetry.” See The Rhetoric of Romanticism, 50. 2 For de Man’s reading of the inability of the aesthetic to reconcile epistemology and ethics in Kant’s Critiques, see “Phenomenality and Materiality in Kant” and “Kant’s Materialism” in Aesthetic Ideology, 70–90, 119–28. Perhaps de Man’s most brutal formulation on the radical incommensurability of language’s constative and performative functions is as follows: “language can posit and language can mean but language cannot posit meaning.” See The Rhetoric of Romanticism, 117. For a suggestive discussion of the relationship between literature and literary theory in light of the chasm between cognition and performance, one which includes an elucidation of the ironies of this chapter’s epigraph, see Cynthia Chase, “Literary Theory as the Criticism of Aesthetics,” 42–63. The gap between performance and cognition is not simply a presupposition of deconstruction. It is a precondition of language as much as a resistance to totalitarianism. Werner Hamacher speaks to the former claim: “If meanings could be posited and positing acts as such could be meaningful, there would be a transparent, communicative, and universal language, thus there would no longer be language: not one in which figures would still be possible and not one in which meaning could be distinguished from what is said.” See “Lectio: de Man’s Imperative,” 196. Bill Readings speaks to the latter claim in a discussion of Jean-François Lyotard: “[T]error consists in seeking to establish the justice of an ethical judgment (prescriptive statement) by reference to a representable order of things (a descriptive statement). Lyotard stresses the impossibility of passage from the

134  Robert E. Mottram true to the just, the incommensurability of descriptive and prescriptive language games. Any politics that seeks to unite the two seeks to establish a representable law, a determinant use of the Idea of justice, and thus leads to totalitarianism, the conception of society as totality that annihilates resistance as, by nature, unjust.” See “The Deconstruction of Politics,” 232. 3 The most consequential chapter in the critique of critiques of Romantic ideology comes in the wake of Jerome McGann’s The Romantic Ideology. As Marc Redfield has adeptly shown, McGann’s critique, as sophisticated as it is, quickly reveals itself to be under the spell of the ideology it seeks to demystify. McGann repeats rather than escapes the ideology, for which, following Redfield, “[t]he work of art transcends its context in and through its historicity, its sensuous presence to itself.” See The Politics of Aesthetics, 31. 4 Walter Benjamin’s rallying cry to politicize art in response to the aestheticization of politics is to be found in the “Epilogue” to his much-reproduced essay on mechanical reproducibility. See Illuminations, 241–42. 5 See de Man’s “Phenomenality and Materiality in Kant,” “Sign and Symbol in Hegel’s Aesthetics,” “Hegel on the Sublime,” “Kant’s Materialism,” and “Kant and Schiller” in Aesthetic Ideology for his reading of the function and failure of the aesthetic in Kant and Hegel to uphold the integrity of their critical philosophies. 6 The virtual synonymity between Novalis and the blue flower in the popular imagination is strong enough to have inspired a popular novel of the same title about Novalis. See Penelope Fitzgerald, The Blue Flower (Boston: Mariner Books, 1995). 7 De Man makes this point in characteristically unambiguous fashion: Whatever writing we do, whatever way we have of talking about art, whatever way we have of teaching, whatever justification we give ourselves for teaching, whatever the standards are and the values by means of which we teach, they are more than ever and profoundly Schillerian. See Aesthetic Ideology, 142. De Man outlines how Schiller valorizes the aesthetic as a solution in his attempt to braid self-determination and pedagogy, whereas in Kant the aesthetic is a problem formidable enough to endanger the integrity of his critical philosophy; see “Kant and Schiller,” in Aesthetic Ideology, 129–62. 8 All translations from Heinrich von Ofterdingen are that of Palmer Hilty unless otherwise indicated. I have checked every English rendering against Werke, Tagebücher und Briefe—itself based on the critical edition of Novalis’ works which I cite by volume and page number where necessary. 9 The forget-me-not appears in the novel’s 2nd part, “The Fulfillment”; see Henry von Ofterdingen, 161; Werke, 1:376. 10 O’Brien references his “slyness,” see Signs of Revolution, 279, 280, 286. Kittler calls the hermit “cunning and in denial through and through” because of his role in luring Heinrich to alphabetization in the discourse network of 1800. See Discourse Networks, 122. 11 For a reading of the hermit in the humanist tradition, see Molnár, 144–47; in his “Kant and Schiller,” de Man has shown how Schiller’s aesthetic education shares enough fundamental principles with totalitarianism to be parroted by none other than Joseph Goebbels. See Aesthetic Ideology, 154–55. 12 By invoking a romantic art religion, I am referencing a hope that crystallized around 1800 that the work of art could intimate the transcendental sphere. Its most fervent expression is to be found in Wackenroder and Tieck’s Heartfelt Outpourings of an Art-loving Monk (Herzergiessungen eines

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  135 kunstliebenden Klosterbruders), but its broader philosophical and political legitimation stems from Schiller’s popularization of Kant’s Critique of Judgment. See de Man, Aesthetic Ideology, 129–62. 13 For an examination of the cave and mine in German romanticism as a metaphor for history, sexuality, and the unconscious, see Ziolkowski, German Romanticism and its Institutions, 18–63. 14 Déjà vu is ubiquitous in Heinrich von Ofterdingen. After listening to the traveling merchants tell of the wondrous poets of a bygone age, Heinrich is sure that he has heard such talk before (1:256). Upon first setting eyes on Heinrich, Zulima, a refugee displaced by the Crusades, exclaims that he awakens in her “eine sonderbare Erinnerung aus frohen Zeiten” (1:282; “strange recollections of happy times” [Henry von Ofterdingen 59–60]). After becoming acquainted with Mathilde, Heinrich recognizes in her face the same features that struck him in his initial dream of the blue flower. See 1:325. Alice Kuzniar comments à propos such instances of déjà vu in Ofterdingen that “[r]ecollection … elicits the presentiment that in the future all will cohere” (Delayed Endings 117). 15 Mémoire involuntaire as a constitutive experience of modernity is the topic of Benjamin’s “On Some Motifs in Baudelaire.” See Illuminations, 155–94. 16 In the second essay of The Genealogy of Morals, Nietzsche likens active forgetting to a concierge whose role is “to shut temporarily the doors and windows of consciousness; to protect us from the noise and agitation with which our lower organs work for or against one another; to introduce a little quiet into our consciousness so as to make room for the nobler functions and functionaries of our organism which do the governing and planning. This concierge maintains order and etiquette in the household of the psyche; which immediately suggests that there can be no happiness, no serenity, no hope, no pride, no present, without oblivion” (The Birth of Tragedy and The Genealogy of Morals 189). 17 For a discussion of the imbrication of the topos of the imagination in romantic discourse with the aesthetic, see White, Romantic Returns, 1–28. White calls the imagination “the crucial Romantic term” for the aesthetic (Romantic Returns 3). 18 For a detailed account of Goethe’s debt to and departure from the imagistic and interpretive resources of the idyll, see Wellbery, The Specular Moment, 3–26. 19 Schaale means “bowl.” I cite Hilty’s alternatingly elegant and odd paraphrase of the poem—agreeing in both rhyme and meter with the original—because it intuits some of my arguments below. I supply my own (literal) renderings of key verses in order to rescue some of the ambiguities that his translation tends to obscure. 20 For a reading of Heinrich von Ofterdingen informed by psychoanalysis that draws out the ramifications of the affinity between the cave and the womb, see Calhoon, Fatherland, 73–82. 21 Kittler, Discourse Networks, 25–69. 22 Nietzsche’s most systematic exposition of his mnemotechnics is to be found in the second essay of The Genealogy of Morals. The most brutal formulation is as follows: “‘A thing is branded on the memory to make it stay there; only what goes on hurting will stick.’—this is one of the oldest and, unfortunately, one of the most enduring psychological axioms” (The Birth of Tragedy and The Genealogy of Morals 192). 23 Franz Schubert did set five of Novalis’ poems to music, but “Gern verweil’ ich noch im Thale” is not among them.

136  Robert E. Mottram 24 The translator’s choice to render these verses in the imperative instead of the indicative may disagree with the punctuation of the original text (the lack of a period at the end of verse 11) but does conform to the sense of urgency marked by the apostrophe (“O!”) with which the verse commences.

Works Cited Adorno, Theodor. Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 4, Minima Moralia: Reflexionen aus dem beschädigten Leben. Ed. Rolf Tiedemann. Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 2003. ———. Minima Moralia: Reflections on a Damaged Life. Trans. E. F. N. Jephcott. London: Verso, 2005. Barthes, Roland. “Romantic Song.” The Responsibility of Forms: Critical Essays on Music, Art, and Representation. Trans. Richard Howard. New York: Hill and Wang, 1985. 286–92. Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations. Trans. Harry Zohn. New York: Schocken, 2007. Blumenberg, Hans. Höhlenausgänge. Frankfurt a. M: Suhrkamp, 1989. Calhoon, Kenneth S. Fatherland: Novalis, Freud, and the Discipline of Romance. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 1992. Chase, Cynthia. “Literary Theory as the Criticism of Aesthetics.” Critical Encounters: Reference and Responsibility in Deconstructive Writing. Ed. Cathy Caruth and Deborah Esch. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1995. 42–91. Culler, Jonathan. “Deconstruction and the Lyric.” Deconstruction Is/In America: A New Sense of the Political. Ed. Anselm Haverkamp. New York: New York UP, 1995. 41–51. ———. Theory of the Lyric. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2015. De Man, Paul. The Rhetoric of Romanticism. New York: Columbia UP, 1984. ———. The Resistance to Theory. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1986. ———. Aesthetic Ideology. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1996. Eagleton, Terry. The Ideology of the Aesthetic. Cambridge: Blackwell, 1990. Hamacher, Werner. “Lectio: de Man’s Imperative.” Reading de Man Reading. Ed. Lindsay Waters and Wlad Godzich. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1989. 171–201. Horkheimer, Max and Theodor Adorno. Dialectic of Enlightenment. Trans. John Cumming. New York: Continuum, 1972. Kittler, Friedrich A. Discourse Networks, 1800/1900. Trans. Michael Metteer. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1990. Koselleck, Reinhart. Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time. Trans. Keith Tribe. New York: Columbia UP, 2004. Kuzniar, Alice A. Delayed Endings: Nonclosure in Novalis and Hölderlin. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1987. Molnár, Géza von. Romantic Vision, Ethical Context: Novalis and Artistic Autonomy. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1987. Nietzsche, Friedrich. The Birth of Tragedy and The Genealogy of Morals. Trans. Francis Golffing. Garden City: Doubleday, 1956. Novalis. Werke, Tagebücher und Briefe. Ed. Hans-Joachim Mähl and Richard Samuel. 3 vols. Munich and Vienna: Carl Hanser Verlag, 1978. ———. Henry von Ofterdingen. Trans. Palmer Hilty. Prospect Heights: Waveland, 1990.

The Memorialization of the Aesthetic  137 O’Brien, William Arctander. Novalis: Signs of Revolution. Durham: Duke UP, 1995. Pfau, Thomas. “Introduction. Reading beyond Redemption: Historicism, Irony, and the Lessons of Romanticism.” Lessons of Romanticism. Ed. Thomas Pfau and Robert F. Gleckner. Durham: Duke UP, 1998. 1–37. ———. Romantic Moods: Paranoia, Trauma, and Melancholy, 1790-1840. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2005. Pyle, Forest. Art’s Undoing: In the Wake of a Radical Aestheticism. New York: Fordham UP, 2014. Readings, Bill. “The Deconstruction of Politics.” Reading de Man Reading. Ed. Lindsay Waters and Wlad Godzich. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1989. 223–43. Redfield, Marc. Phantom Formations: Aesthetic Ideology and the Bildungsroman. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1996. ———. The Politics of Aesthetics: Nationalism, Gender, Romanticism. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2003. Schiller, Friedrich. On the Aesthetic Education of Man. Trans. Elizabeth M. Wilkinson and L.A. Willoughby. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985. ———. Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen in einer Reihe von Briefen. Stuttgart: Reclam, 2000. Stewart, Garrett. Reading Voices: Literature and the Phonotext. Berkeley: U of California P, 1990. Wellbery, David E. The Specular Moment: Goethe’s Early Lyric and the Beginnings of Romanticism. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1996. White, Deborah Elise. Romantic Returns: Superstition, Imagination, History. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2000. Ziolkowski, Theodore. German Romanticism and its Institutions. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1990.

6 The Effect of Memory Embellishments on Reality in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “Des Vetters Eckfenster” Joseph D. Rockelmann E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “Des Vetters Eckfenster”1 was published in 1822, only two months before Hoffmann himself passed away.2 The novella consists of a discussion about the art of seeing that takes place between two cousins. The older cousin, an author, has suffered an illness that has rendered him paralyzed and unable to use his legs, and thus he cannot leave his apartment. However, his corner window looks out over the Theaterplatz in Berlin, and from there he can still observe the world as it passes by on the square below.3 When his younger cousin—the narrator—comes to visit him, he decides to teach him the intricacies of describing the visible and invisible. Seeing is interpreting, and thus the “seen” activates the viewer’s memories and elicits them not only to contemplate what they are seeing but also how it fits into their life. Each viewer’s interpretation is thus going to be different since the “seen” will elicit different memories and spark certain emotional responses. James Elkins points out that “in cognitive psychology, it has been claimed that the ability to comprehend images is linked to memory itself” (Object Stares Back 137). The memory of each individual differs and therefore each person will see something different when looking at the identical object. Richard Solso states, “Each of us sees the world in profoundly different ways because of the vast diversity in the way we humans develop individual mental structures of the world” (3). Seeing is then influenced by what the viewer remembers. When taking a closer look at the text, Hoffmann is pointing out that the more memories we have, the more we can see since they “provide the conscious subject with the dominant ideas [they] store up” (Locke 153). However, memories are not always accurate. They can be modifications of reality in order for them to fit better into our Weltbild (world view).4 In Hoffmann’s text we see how the older cousin relies on his memories of people he encountered on the market square in the past to describe not only their physical appearance but also to comment on their background. The internal is projected onto the “seen.” Michele Cometa comments,

DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-9

Memory Embellishments  139 The paralyzed cousin … knows how to move through the four levels of image: the market and its players, the assumptions about their background, the memories that come from his past as an observer and then the projections that one can do on the course of events. (165) Alan Richardson summarizes the problem of memory subjectivity as follows: Memory takes the factual as its province: it functions to preserve matters of autobiographical and historical record. Few today would want to claim that memory, whether individual or collective, accurately preserves objective and immutable truths about nature and the world. Memories are widely viewed as subject to inevitable biases and distortion when they are stored and retrieved. Still, we expect memory at least to aspire to truthfulness. (277) Straub makes another significant point in regard to memory by stating that “[it] is no tabula rasa or a blank wax tablet onto which any content may be inscribed, nor a neutral storage medium which passively records just anything and on demand reproduces it unaltered” (221). The two cousins demonstrate how memory can be used in different ways when looking at the world and how easily the “seen” can be distorted or enriched by memories. The focus of Hoffmann’s story is the older cousin’s descriptions of the numerous people at the market in Berlin.5 The view from his window alludes to the “strukturbildende Qualität des panoramischen Sehens” (Eicher 361; “quality of structural compositions of panoramic seeing”).6 The panoramic view has given the older cousin the advantage of having an overview of all of the activities taking place at the market. However, he is not fooled by the panorama being able to encompass reality as a well-organized whole as Eicher points out.7 The older cousin has been engaging in the act of looking closely at people visiting the Theaterplatz since the onset of his writer’s block and illness.8 His binoculars allow him not only to have a panoramic view but to also see individuals up close and to observe their interactions, which captivate his attention.9 Roger Cook asserts that the older cousin takes a greater interest in the market scene now since he is no longer able to write and needs to find something to do with all of his time (428). Instead of just viewing all people as readers of his works, as he had done previously, he is now seeing how each individual has their own story and is thus unique and worth studying.10

140  Joseph D. Rockelmann The cousin’s corner window, … offers an open view onto the microcosmic social world of the Berlin Gendarmenmarkt. But the cousin was only superficially acquainted with the panoramic view from his window until the writer’s block. When he gave up his writing, he began to look out the corner window with new eyes for the people at the marketplace, who until then he had viewed primarily as idealized readers. (Cook 428) What Cook does not mention are the binoculars, which are by the window, and which are instrumental in the older cousin’s viewing of the marketplace. Without them he would not have been able to observe the market scene and the details of the individual participants.11 However, Cook does state how looking through the corner window “represents a shift in focus from the inner world of the writer’s imagination to the public world of social interaction” (Cook 427), since he is no longer capable of translating his thoughts and ideas onto paper. Cometa states, the cousin, indeed, renounces all the other senses: he does not move, he does not eat, he no longer writes. He becomes the symbol of the very modern compulsive voyeurism, which is certainly a figure of the modern mass society spectacle. (164) The window allows the cousin to participate in life while it eases his feeling of melancholy. The salutary effects of the window perspective surprise the narrator since his cousin’s health and mood had been deteriorating until now and had shown no sign of improving. “Vetter!” sprach er eines Tages zu mir, mit einem Ton, der mich erschreckte, “Vetter mit mir ist es aus! Ich komme mir vor wie jener alte, vom Wahnsinn zerrüttete Maler, der Tage lang vor einer in den Rahmen gespannten grundierten Leinwand saß und allen, die zu ihm kamen, die mannigfachen Schönheiten des reichen, herrlichen Gemäl­ des anpries, das er soeben vollendet; —ich geb’s auf, das wirkende, schaffende Leben, welches, zur äußern Form gestaltet, aus mir selbst hinaustritt, sich mit der Welt befreundend. —Mein Geist zieht sich in seine Klause zurück.” (DKV 469) “Cousin!” he said to me one day in a tone that alarmed me, “it’s all up with me! I feel like the old painter whose mind was completely unhinged and who spent entire days sitting in front of a framed canvas with a first coat of paint on it, and telling all his visitors about the manifold beauties of the rich and magnificent painting he had just

Memory Embellishments  141 completed. I give it up, the active, creative life that emerges from my mind in distinct forms and links me with the world! My spirit is retiring to its cell!” (Hoffmann 378)12 These words reflect the defeated spirit of a writer who is depressed because he is no longer able to write. However, a sudden change is noticeable upon the narrator’s entrance into his cousin’s apartment a week later. He tells him, “Aber dies Fenster ist mein Trost, hier ist mir das bunte Leben auf’s Neue aufgegangen, und ich fühle mich befreundet mit seinem niemals rastenden Treiben. Komm Vetter, schau hinaus!” (DKV 471; “But this window is my comfort; it is here that life in all its colour has been revealed to me anew, and I feel at home with its incessant activity. Come, cousin, look outside” [Hoffmann 379]). What has led to the older cousin’s metamorphosis is not addressed explicitly by Hoffmann, but is rather left for the reader to determine by interpreting the text carefully and recognizing what is implied. It is the aesthetic discovery the older cousin has made that excites him, not the actual spectacle he witnesses from his window.13 The author has discovered another medium to interact with and to capture the world. Die verschiedensten Farben glänzten im Sonnenschein, und zwar in ganz kleinen Flecken, auf mich machte dies den Eindruck eines großen, vom Winde bewegten, hin und her wogenden Tulpenbeets, und ich mußte mir gestehen, daß der Anblick zwar recht artig, aber auf die Länge ermüdend sei, ja wohl gar aufgereizten Personen einen kleinen Schwindel verursachen könne, der dem nicht unangenehmen Delirieren des nahenden Traums gliche; darin suchte ich das Vergnügen, das das Eckfenster dem Vetter gewähre, und äußerte ihm dieses ganz unverhohlen. (DKV 471) Tiny speks of the most varied colours were gleaming in the sunshine; this gave me the impression of a large bed of tulips being blown hither and thither by the wind, and I had to confess that the view, while certainly very attractive, soon became tiring, and might give over-sensitive people a slight feeling of giddiness, like the most disagreeable delirium one feels at the onset of a dream. I assumed that this accounted for the pleasure that my cousin derived from this corner window, and told him so quite frankly. (Hoffmann 379–80) All the narrator sees at first is a chaotic scene and numerous colors, which remind him of an impressionistic painting, making it hard for him to identify anything. “Framed viewing is the name of ‘sectional seeing’ (Langen 20) that artificially delimits the visual field with the help of

142  Joseph D. Rockelmann optical devices (telescope, camera obscura, peep box, window) and thereby makes individual objects distinctly recognizable in the first place” (Krauss 415). By having the older cousin introduce the narrator to Rahmenschau (framed view),14 the narrator is able to identify individuals, which he then describes in detail to his cousin. Der Vetter: Sieh einmal gerade vor dich herab in die Straße, hier hast du mein Glas, bemerkst du wohl die etwas fremdartig gekleidete Person mit dem großen Marktkorbe am Arm, die, mit einem Bürstenbinder in tiefem Gespräch begriffen, ganz geschwinde andere Domestika abzu­ machen scheint, als die des Leibes Nahrung betreffen? Ich: Ich habe sie gefaßt. Sie hat ein grell Citronenfarbiges Tuch nach französischer Art Turbanähnlich um den Kopf gewunden, und ihr Gesicht, so wie ihr ganzes Wesen, zeigt deutlich die Französin. (DKV 471–72) MY COUSIN: Look directly down into the street—here are my fieldglasses—do you see the somewhat strangely dressed person with a large shopping-basket on her arm who is deep in conversation with a brush-maker and seems to be hurriedly settling domestic matters quite unconnected with bodily nourishment? ME: I’ve got her. She has a bright lemon-yellow cloth wound round her head like a turban, in the French style, and her face, as well as her whole appearance, shows clearly that she’s a Frenchwoman. (Hoffmann 380) As a writer, the older cousin creates new characters and contexts, and when the narrator zooms in with the binoculars15 on individuals at the market, his cousin is creating Rahmenschau. By gazing at the square through the window frame and describing what he sees, the older cousin presents the reader with market scenes resembling paintings, which are “mounted” in a picture frame suggested by the window. By translating the visual image into the verbal, Hoffmann creates a textual ekphrasis which allows the reader, via the narrator’s description, to see much more than what first meets the eye. A new visual mode comes about here due to the cousins’ two types of seeing merging and delivering a more complete representation of the “seen.”16 Framing the image in this way “composes” it, and it thus resembles a painting one might see in a gallery. The artist depicts a scene in great detail and the art historian might add a text below the painting that describes the depiction, giving it meaning and content. The aesthetic experience moves beyond just admiring the beautiful. The beautiful is also understood because of the additional information. But since the older cousin has lost the ability to write, these words and insights get lost in space because they have never been preserved on a sheet of paper. Thus, he relies on an oral tradition and hopes his words

Memory Embellishments  143 will be recorded by his younger cousin, who, however, is oblivious to the importance the older cousin places on him capturing the words. Hence, the words and descriptions are lost forever. The marketplace becomes the older cousin’s canvas, onto which he can project his imagination and creativity, which is precisely what the narrator struggles with since he is interested in a realistic and mimetic description of what he is seeing. “Von allem, was du da herauskombinierst, lieber Vetter, mag kein Wörtchen wahr sein, aber indem ich die Weiber anschaue ist mir, Dank sei es deiner lebendigen Darstellung, alles so plausibel, daß ich daran glauben muß, ich mag wollen oder nicht” (DKV 475; “It may be, dear cousin, that not one word of all your conjectures is true, but as I look at the old women your vivid description sounds so plausible that I am compelled to believe willy-nilly” [Hoffmann 383]). The narrator critiques the older cousin’s type of seeing but at the same time he admires it because it is so persuasive, gripping, and entertaining that he accepts his cousin’s challenge to try to emulate his creative descriptions of the “seen.”17 Byrd points out in his article how Eicher describes “the visitor as a ‘passive receptive’ viewer who needs to be rescued out of his undifferentiated scan of the tulip bed” (Byrd 251). The older cousin is able to see beyond the subject or object since he understands that vision, the act of seeing, is itself a creative activity. What we see is not a bare level of reality, but is a picture of the world and its events which we have preconceived in order to see them at all. (Cook 424) The narrator is unskilled in interpreting the “seen” and thus only sees reality but not the invisible which is hidden below the surface. The older cousin wants to introduce the narrator to a world where the two merge and no clear boundaries exist. “The knowledge that there is no clear distinction between the real and the imagined is that premise of artistic vision he promised to teach the narrator” (Cook 423). The older cousin states that it is a skill that can be learned if one is willing to acquire it. James Elkins observes, It is difficult to break through the wall of the usual seeing and begin to discover how many other things there are to see. It requires practice and special information—you have to know what you’re looking for— and it also requires energy, since it involves special concentration. (50) Being observant of what is taking place around one and adding to the “seen” by analyzing the situation, behavior, and physiognomy of the individuals being observed will lead to a more complete and profound viewing.18

144  Joseph D. Rockelmann The narrator will not understand how the simple observation of the marketplace can lead to his cousin’s changed mood as long as he is not in possession of an eye “which is really looking.” The act of seeing is not merely “done” or “not done”: it is not an activity that toggles between “seen” and “not seen,” but rather occurs over a spectrum of degrees of “seeing.” The older cousin indicates that it can be done well and poorly, with many gradations in between. Elkins notes, “Seeing is not easy: it is not easy to do, it is not easy to control, and it is certainly not easy to understand” (124). The older cousin holds the opinion that, in order to move beyond superficial seeing, all of the different facets of the marketplace need to be appreciated. Byrd highlights the importance of the three prefixes placed before schauen by Hoffmann: The three prefixes zu-, an-, er- placed before the infinitive schauen closely match how the two cousins observe the crowded market square to produce literature. The two characters direct their attention to a specific point or feature (zuschauen), and then this detail is contemplated and studied (anschauen). The final step in this process of fictionalization is the emergence of an interpretation (erschauen). (Pedagogy of Observation 115) The viewer must elaborate on people’s behaviors and actions, so that the opportunity arises to see more than what first meets the eye. Elkins asserts that “the world is filled with things we do not see, even though they are right in front us” (54). The narrator notices that his older cousin’s instructions have helped him to see the intricate details of the market which gives him pleasure because looking has transformed into an intriguing and skillful activity.19 Ich: Wahrhaftig, lieber Vetter! du hast mich jetzt schon besser schauen gelehrt. Indem ich meinen Blick in dem bunten Gewühl der wogenden Menge umherschweifen lasse, fallen mir hin und wieder junge Mädchen in die Augen, die von sauber angezogenen Köchinnen, welche geräumige, glänzende Marktkörbe am Arme tragen, begleitet den Markt durchstreifen, und um Hausbedürfnisse, wie sie der Markt darbietet, feilschen. Der Mädchen modester Anzug, ihr ganzer Anstand, läßt nicht daran zweifeln, daß sie wenigstens vornehmen bürgerlichen Standes sind. (DKV 476) ME: Truly, dear cousin, you have already taught me to see better. As my gaze roams amid the colourful, surging throng, I keep noticing young girls who wander through the market in the company of neatly dressed cooks carrying large and gleaming shopping baskets, and haggle over such household necessities as the market affords. The

Memory Embellishments  145 girl’s modest attire and respectable bearing proves that they come at least from good middle-class homes. (Hoffmann 383–84) However, the narrator is still unable to add a narrative to the individuals he has been able to pick out of the crowd. He is still working on developing the skill of not just describing the “seen” individual but rather allowing it to trigger his memory and imagination in order to attach a narrative to each one.20 This method of translating image into text is constructivist, since it becomes apparent that the older cousin believes “that what exists is a product of what is thought” (Bruner 96). The content of his inner world needs to be applied to the “seen” in order for “real looking” to manifest itself. Hoffmann points out that there is the external eye of the senses and the internal eye of the imagination and that when you combine them you receive an intriguing picture of the world.21 Mental constructions are being projected onto an objective world as pointed out by Bruner when he discusses Humes’ discovery in regard to how we interact with the world (Bruner 96). The reason it is challenging is because the younger cousin is not accustomed to looking in this more sophisticated manner. He needs to develop the practice of transforming what he sees into his own reality, and for that he must also realize that there is no single, objective one. This is, in the older cousin’s opinion, where true looking is taking place because the eye is looking beyond the scene and “seen.” The question becomes: can what the older cousin is doing be defined as “actual seeing?” The older cousin is extending his space by attaching past events of his life to the people that are at the market. Is his “seeing” actually a type of “pseudo-seeing,” since it does not focus on the subject or object at hand but rather uses it as a memory trigger for events and people he has encountered throughout his lifetime? The older cousin is aware that his life is coming to an end and is thus reflecting on past events, people he has known, and meaningful things he has encountered. His seeing is influenced by his personal memories. —fällt mir ein dass ich einmal in meiner Kindheit hörte, es sei auf einer reichen Bauerhochzeit so splendid hergegangen, dass der delikate, mit einer dicken Kruste von Zimt, Zucker und Nelken überhautete Reisbrei, mittels eines Dreschflegels, verteilt worden. Jeder der werten Gäste durfte nur ganz gemütlich das Maul aufsperren, um die gehörige Portion zu bekommen, und es ging auf diese Weise recht zu, wie im Schlaraffenland. (DKV 483) I recall hearing in my childhood about a rich peasant’s wedding conducted in such splendour that a delicious rice-pudding, coated with a thick crust of cinnamon, sugar, and cloves, was dispensed by means of a threshing-flail. Each of the honoured guests had only to open his

146  Joseph D. Rockelmann mouth cheerfully to receive his portion, and so it was just like the Land of Cockayne. (390) Past events have had a great impact on the older cousin and have shaped his memory.22 He is unable to master the dichotomy since he is no longer able to move from the imagined world back to the real world: he has cognitively fused his imagination and memory. The older cousin has seen much more in his lifetime than the narrator has and thus has more memories to access when describing different scenes and people. However, their contextualization is far from a simple activity, since they possess their own temporal, locational, and personal circumstances, and they need imaginative framing to make them coherent and meaningful. According to Daniel Schacter, “memories are not simply activated pictures in the mind but complex constructions built from multiple contributors” (209). Memories play an instrumental role in seeing. When the older cousin has the narrator focus on a woman with a silk hat, it becomes apparent that the narrator is focused on a realistic, mimetic description. Ich: Was für eine tolle Figur—ein seidner Hut, der in capriziöser Formlosigkeit stets jeder Mode Trotz geboten, mit bunten in den Lüften wehenden Federn—ein kurzer seidner Überwurf, dessen Farbe in das ursprüngliche Nichts zurückgekehrt—darüber ein ziemlich honetter Shawl—der Florbesatz des gelb kattunenen Kleides reicht bis an die Knöchel—blaugraue Strümpfe—Schnürstiefeln—hinter ihr eine stattliche Magd mit zwei Marktkörben, einem Fischnetz, einem Mehlsack.—Gott sei bei uns! was die seidene Person für wütende Blicke um sich wirft, mit welcher Wut sie eindringt in die dicksten Haufen—wie sie alles angreift, Gemüse, Obst, Fleisch u.s.w.; wie sie beäugelt, betastet, um alles feilscht und nichts erhandelt. (DKV 472–73) ME: What an extraordinary figure: a silken hat whose capricious shapelessness has bidden defiance to every fashion, with coloured feathers waving in the breeze, a short silk jacket, whose colour has returned to the primal nothingness, over it a fairly decent shawl, her yellow calico dress, embroidered with flowers round the edge, reaches to her ankles, bluish-grey stockings, laced boots. Following her, a fine-looking maid with two shopping baskets, a fish-net, a meal-bag. God help us! What furious glances the person in silk is casting all around, how furiously she forces her way into the thickest clusters of people—how she grabs everything, vegetables, fruit, meat, and so forth; how she looks at everything, feels it, haggles over it, and yet never buys anything. (Hoffmann 381)

Memory Embellishments  147 The older cousin labels the woman a “rabiate Hausfrau” (DKV 473; “rabid housewife” [Hoffmann 381]) and creates a narrative for her based on this label. He is projecting a description onto the woman which stems from his imagination, which is in turn made up of numerous memories that he has assembled like a collage. “Ich nenne diese Person, die keinen Markttag fehlt, die rabiate Hausfrau. Es kommt mir vor, als müsse sie die Tochter eines reichen Bürgers, vielleicht eines wohlhabenden Seifensieders sein, deren Hand, nebst annexis, ein kleiner Geheim-Secretair nicht ohne Anstrengung erworben” (DKV 473; “This person never misses a single market-day, and I call her ‘the rabid housewife’. I suspect that she must be the daughter of a wealthy townsman, perhaps a well-to-do soap-boiler, and that some minor privy secretary, not without difficulty, gained her hand, and all that that appertains thereto” [Hoffmann 381]). Also, the older cousin “frames individual characters, mostly individual figures’ details, according to a technique that is still the traditional one proposed by Lichtenberg and Lavater’s physiognomy” (Cometa 192). By doing so, he is personalizing the market square, breaking up the anonymous crowd and creating individual biographies for the seen people. When the narrator picks out another person, he again attempts to imitate the type of looking his older cousin engages in, but he only partially succeeds since he still only describes in detail what he sees but not the unseen story of the selected individual. “Was für ein orginelles, ausdrucksvolles Gesicht—feingeschlossene Lippen—eine Habichtsnase—große, schwarze Augen—hochstehende, starke Augenbrauen—eine hohe Stirn— schwarzes Haar—das Toupe en coeur frisiert, mit kleinen steifen Löckchen über den Ohren” (DKV 483–84; “What an original, expressive face: narrow lips, an aquiline nose, big dark eyes, a high forehead, black hair, his wig dressed en coeur, with stiff little curls above his ears” [390]). The older cousin eventually interrupts him since he is eager to share his hypothesis about the young man with the narrator. His description is detailed and creative, turning the good-looking man into an unlikeable individual. “Genug habe ich mir schon über diese exotische Figur den Kopf zerbrochen.—Was denkst du, Vetter, zu meiner Hypothese? Dieser Mensch ist ein alter Zeichenmeister, der in mittelmäßigen Schulanstalten sein Wesen getrieben hat, und vielleicht noch treibt. Durch allerlei industriöse Unternehmungen hat er viel Geld erworben; er ist geizig, mißtrauisch, Zyniker bis zum Ekelhaften, Hagestolz, —” (DKV 484–85; “I’ve already spent plenty of time racking my brains over this exotic figure. What do you think, cousin, of my hypothesis? The man is an old drawing-master who has pursued his career, and perhaps still does, in schools of middling quality. Thanks to various industrious enterprises, he has accumulated a lot of money; he is miserly, mistrustful, a hateful cynic, a selfish bachelor —” [Hoffmann 391]). The old cousin’s corner window “becomes part of an iconoteque, a place where images are produced, consumed and transmitted” (Cometa 172). Seen people are the equivalent of a blank canvas onto which the older cousin may project images from his imagination.

148  Joseph D. Rockelmann When the narrator states that he finds this individual unpleasant and offensive, the older cousin states that he can provide him with a more pleasant biography. The older cousin enjoys creating new characters for his pseudo-play, the market square, by using his imagination and memories which he customarily utilized for his writing. This new creative activity puts him at ease since he has found a new creative outlet.23 Alan Richardson points out that “some researchers have adopted the term ‘mental time travel’ to describe the human cognitive ability to project oneself mentally back into the past through recollection” (278). We could argue then that life is made up of numerous single moments, to use G.E. Lessing’s terminology. Lessing, for example, commends Timomachus’ painting of Medea since he picked the perfect single moment. “Die Medea hatte er [=Timomachus] nicht in dem Augenblick genommen, in welchem sie ihre Kinder wirklich ermordet; sondern einige Augenblicke zuvor, da die mütterliche Liebe noch mit der Eifersucht kämpfet. Wir sehen das Ende dieses Kampfes voraus” (Lessing, Laokoon, FA 5/2 33; “Timomachus did not represent Medea at the moment she was actually murdering her children, but a few moments before, when a mother’s love was still struggling with her vengefulness. We can foresee the outcome of this struggle” [McCormick 21]). According to Lessing, no painting could possibly be more powerful than our own imagination. Furthermore, the single moment lures the viewer into the painting since they want to know what is about to happen. Depicting a single moment captivates the viewer more than if the climax were depicted since they need to add information to the painting. When describing the various people at the marketplace, the older cousin refuses to state a climax to each scenario he conjures up, but rather fills in the missing information imaginatively, rendering the illusion that he is in control of the Theaterplatz world in which he lives as an author who dictates the story. His imagination, fed by his memory, influences how he and his cousin “see.” Lessing would indicate that the older cousin has a deeper understanding of how to interact with the seen objects and individuals. Lessing states, “Je mehr wir sehen, desto mehr müssen wir hinzu denken können. Je mehr wir dazu denken, desto mehr müssen wir zu sehen glauben” (Lessing, Laokoon FA 5/2, 32; “The more we see, the more we must be able to imagine. And the more we add in our imaginations, the more we must think we see” [McCormick 19]). It becomes apparent that Lessing finds it of the utmost importance that the individual is using his own knowledge to interpret the “seen”. Krauss writes “the really viewing eye evidently is to be understood within the horizon of rationally making distinct the sensual experience of color as well as eighteenth-century Enlightenment physiognomic techniques of observation and analysis” (414). The “seen” not only requires the individual to describe the visual but also interpret it, which compels them to use their imagination; without imagination they will be unable to see and understand the visual in its entirety, since the single moment is alluding to many different components.

Memory Embellishments  149 Seeing can also trigger unpleasant memories and cause the viewer to relive a traumatic experience. Schacter refers to this as an episodic memory since it allows us “explicitly to recall the personal incident that uniquely defines our lives” (17). Throughout the story, the older cousin is enjoying the activity of “seeing.” However, when he spots a young flower girl down below, he recalls his own frustration with writing—especially with how little most people care about the author of the text they are reading. “Es fand sich, daß das Mädchen niemals daran gedacht, daß die Bücher, welche sie lese, vorher gedichtet werden müßten. Der Begriff eines Schriftstellers, eines Dichters war ihr gänzlich fremd, und ich glaube wahrhaftig, bei näherer Nachfrage wäre der fromme kindliche Glaube ans Licht gekommen, daß der liebe Gott die Bücher wachsen ließe, wie die Pilze” (DKV 481; “Apparently it had never entered the girl’s head that the books she read must first have been composed. She had no idea that such things as writers or authors existed, and I verily think that closer enquiry would have elicited from her the pious, child-like belief that God made books grow, like mushrooms” [Hoffmann 388]). Relieving this traumatic experience is allowing him to process what the flower girl told him, but at the same time one can tell that it has scarred him psychologically, because he is no longer able to practice the craft of writing since this distressing encounter took place. Fritz Breithaupt points out that “it is by means of memory that wounds of the past, if they have not succeeded in killing the individual, can become the most important assets of the self” (80). The event has changed how the oldest cousin views himself, which interferes with the creative process of writing, since he has been unable to categorize it as an event he has experienced, an Erlebnis according to Walter Benjamin (163). This inability has led to the encounter with the flower girl entering his experience (Erfahrung) resulting in it having manifested itself permanently in his memory (Benjamin 163). Schacter writes “our sense of ourselves depends crucially on the subjective experience of remembering our pasts” (34). Schacter refers to this as a burned-in visual impression since it is one that the individual is unable to forget or remove from memory.24 Breithaupt states that the reader is confronted with the “Wiederholungszwang” (“repetition compulsion”) in Hoffmann’s works, since he argues that Hoffmann “views trauma as a place without escape— the self as a prison” (Breithaupt 80). The negative memories keep on resurfacing, causing anxiety and depression. “Aber der Weg, den der Gedanke verfolgen mußte, um auf dem Papiere gestaltet zu erscheinen, hatte der böse Dämon der Krankheit versperrt” (DKV 468–69; “But the path that his thoughts had to follow in order to appear fully formed on paper had been blocked by the evil demon of illness” [Hoffmann 377]). Traumatic events usually lead those affected by them to try to repress them in order to move on and lead somewhat normal lives. However, trauma interferes with the present life since traumatic memories can be triggered at any time, transporting the mind back to the place which has

150  Joseph D. Rockelmann permanently left a mark on the brain. David Darby points out that the incident represents “the decay of a world view that has defined his [=the older cousin’s] identity, his literary practice, and his relationship with the rest of humanity” (294). Subconsciously the older cousin is unsure how to meet the new interests and demands of the readership, resulting in a writing paralysis. “Paralysis from horror, or Schrecklähmung, was familiar enough to establish itself in German as a separate diagnostic term [in the 19th century]” (Shorter 112). In reality, the older cousin is unwilling to take the changing tastes and views of society into account, since he has never been compelled to do so in the past. The narrator states, So wie Scarron, schriftstellert mein Vetter, so wie Scarron, ist er mit besonderer lebendiger Laune begabt und treibt wunderlichen humoristischen Scherz auf seine eigene Weise. Doch zum Ruhme des deutschen Schriftstellers sei es bemerkt, daß er niemals für nötig achtete, seine kleinen pikanten Schüsseln mit Asa fötida zu würzen, um die Gaumen seiner deutschen Leser, die dergleichen nicht wohl vertragen, zu kitzeln. Es genügt ihm das edle Gewürz, welches, indem es reizt, auch stärkt. (DKV 468) Like Scaron, my cousin is a writer; like Scaron, he is endowed with an especially lively wit, and indulges in remarkably humorous jesting in his own way. To the credit of the German writer, however, let it be noted that he never thought it necessary to spice his little savory dishes with asafoetida in order to tackle the palates of his German readers, who do not relish such things. He is content with the nobler sort of spice which both delights and invigorates. (Hoffmann 377) According to the narrator, the older cousin is responsible for his own decline as the result of not being willing to change with the times. His complacency disconnects him from his readers. The young flower girl is a metaphor for how he is out of touch with what his readership is interested in. By not producing new texts, he figures that people like the flower girl will be forced to ask themselves why there are no new stories available like the ones they have read and enjoyed so much in the past. He is hoping that they will then realize the importance of the author and value his craft more. Unfortunately, this is not what happens once he stops writing, due to the existence of other writers who can fill the void, and, therefore, the writer’s block becomes permanent. The older cousin has to come to terms with the lesson he has learned, namely that the literary text is now the protagonist, rather than the author. Literature is there to be consumed like other products. The identity of who wrote it is of little interest. The increase in literacy and the acceleration of urban growth at

Memory Embellishments  151 the time created a mass book market. In his essay, Byrd alludes to the new book market being the real problem for the older cousin due to the demotion of the author. The flower merchant troubles the old man because she has mastered the book market. She accesses literature through a lending library, reports that she borrows books and reads them numerous times, and seems to assume that the older cousin might be interested in the book she has on loan. For that reason, she matter-of-factly instructs him that she exchanges books each afternoon. The flower merchant believes, therefore, that books are commodities detached from their authors. They are manufactured goods that freely circulate, often at odds with a particular author’s proprietary claim. (260–61) These developments led to the marketing of books and an increase in publishing to satisfy the demand. The growth of the middle class and increase in pay for the working class made book publishing lucrative at the time. However, the older cousin is fighting the commodification of literature rather than joining in. The narrator’s failure to understand the importance of the recent developments in publishing and how they relate to his cousin’s current health prevents the older cousin from recovering and returning to writing. Rather, the narrator “writes it off as a simple case of ‘gestrafte Autoreitelkeit’ [‘punished authorial vanity,’] and directs attention away from the story back to the marketplace” (Cook 425). The narrator displays his youth and inexperience, because he does not understand the complexity of the story his cousin has shared with him. The older cousin’s initial reaction of withdrawing from society is one the narrator has exaggerated, since in his perspective he needs only to adjust to and fulfill the interests of the new readership. The moment the market ends, the older cousin falls into a melancholic mood. The view from his window no longer intrigues him. His imagination and ability to identify individuals are required to make sense of the impressionistic scene, but only when the market is in progress. The older cousin enjoys this activity since it leads to the realization that he has seen and experienced a lot in his lifetime and is also still able to create new narratives in a different medium, namely an oral one. At the end of the story, the older cousin concludes that it is not the reader that needs to change but the writer. The older cousin needs to see with new eyes in order to write literary texts that will fulfill the new readership’s demands and interests.25 “Dieser Markt”, sprach der Vetter, “ist auch jetzt ein treues Abbild des ewig wechselnden Lebens. Rege Tätigkeit, das Bedürfnis des Augenblicks, trieb die Menschenmasse zusammen; in wenigen

152  Joseph D. Rockelmann Augenblicken ist alles verödet, die Stimmen, welche im wirren Getöse durcheinander strömten, sind verklungen, und jede verlassene Stelle spricht das schauerliche: es war!” (DKV 497) “This market,” said my cousin, “is still a true picture of ever-changing life. Bustling activity and momentary needs brought the mass of people together; within a few minutes all is deserted, the voices that mingled in a bewildering tumult have died away, and every abandoned spot utters only too audibly the dreaded message: ‘There used to be ...’” (Hoffmann 401) The cousin’s imagination, which relies on his memories, allows him to embellish the scene and to create new stories, but this activity also reminds him of his lost abilities. Memory on the one hand supports his imagination, leading to interesting and entertaining stories, but it also prevents him from expressing his stories in the written medium due to the trauma paralyzing his hands whenever he attempts to write.

Notes 1 E.T.A. Hoffmann, “Des Vetters Eckfenster,” Sämtliche Werke. 6 vols., ed. Gerhard Allroggen, Hartmut Steinecke, Wulf Segebrecht, and Ursula Segebrecht [Frankfurt-am-Main: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985–2004], vol. 6, Späte Prosa, Briefe, Tagebücher und Aufzeichnungen, juristische Schriften: Werke 1814–1822, ed. Gerhard Allroggen, et al., Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker 185 (Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 2004), 468–97, (hereafter referred to as DKV and page number). 2 Roger Cook writes, “At the beginning of 1822, Hoffmann’s illness had taken a turn for the worse, to the point that he was confined to a wheelchair. In the first half of April, after the progressing nerve disorder had deprived him of the use of his hands, he dictated Des Vetters Eckfenster. The invalid writer of the story, like Hoffmann at the time, is able neither to walk nor write and can bear only small portions of the most digestible foods” (422). 3 Hoffmann himself was paralyzed “in the last months of his life” (Cometa 164). 4 Jürgen Straub points out that “People do not simply memorize objectively existing things (events, etc.), which thereafter can be neutrally perceived, captured in a universal symbolic system, and preserved in static form. Rather, already in the act of perception and reception, they transform a given thing into a phenomenon which can be and is worth being memorized, a meaningful and therefore communicable experience. They structure and organize the material of their perception and tie it in with previous knowledge” (221). 5 Vance Byrd observes that “there has been much discussion about how Hoffmann writes about the city in this story. Critics have asked whether the manner of representation is typical of his Romanticism, whether the author is taking a turn toward realism, or even looking back to the Enlightenment. Others have asked whether his social sketches are impressionistic or have a photographic or filmic quality” (Pedagogy of Observation 98). 6 All translations of the German secondary sources are my own unless indicated otherwise.

Memory Embellishments  153 7 “Sie [die Panoramen] geben dem Sehenden das beruhigende Gefühl, die Wirklichkeit als wohlgeordnetes Ganzes erfassen zu können, während diese doch in Wahrheit immer differenzierter und unüberschaubarer werden” (Eich 361; “The panoramas give the person who is seeing the calming feeling that they can grasp reality as a well organized whole while in reality it is becoming more defined and unmanageable”). 8 The narrator compares the older cousin’s fate with Scarron’s. “So wie dieser hat mein Vetter durch eine hartnäckige Krankheit den Gebrauch seiner Füße fänzlich verloren, und es tut Not, daß er sich mit Hülfe standhafter Krücken, und des nervigten Arms eines grämlichen Invaliden, der nach Belieben den Krankenwärter macht, aus dem Bette in den mit Kissen bepackten Lehnstuhl, und aus dem Lehnstuhl in das Bette schrotet” (DKV 468; “Like him, my cousin has entirely lost the use of his legs owing to an intractable illness, and he needs the help of some stout crutches, and the muscular arm of a surly ex-soldier who acts as a nurse when in the mood, to stagger from his bed to an armchair piled with cushions, and from the armchair to his bed” [Hoffmann 377]). 9 Numerous scholars have pointed out how Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Man of the Crowd” (1840) was influenced by Hoffmann’s text. The difference in Poe’s text is that the narrator is watching the spectacle from behind a window in a café. When one passer-by captures his attention, he decides to follow him through the city in order to gain more information on him. In the end the narrator must realize that he is just a man of the crowd, one of many. 10 Horst Daemmrich points out in The Shattered Self that Hoffmann “was a keen observer, indeed, a biting critic of society and social conditions” (20). He continues by stating that Hoffmann’s “primary concern was man and not an objective, truthful picture of social conditions” (20). 11 Mihaela Bancila states in her dissertation that “the function of the binoculars in the story “Des Vetters Eckfenster” differs from the one presented in other texts precisely because the optical tool is seen here as an instrument that fires the imagination. It helps the inner eye see, it stimulates the mind to build hypotheses, and therefore serves as a lever of the external world (“der Hebel der Außenwelt”) as Cyprian observes in the Serapionsbrüder” (49). 12 Translation from E.T.A. Hoffmann. “My Cousin’s Corner Window.” The Golden Pot and Other Tales. Trans. Ritchie Robertson. (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008), 377–401 (cited as Hoffmann with page references in parenthetical notes in text). 13 Benjamin asserts “that this consists of an ability to enjoy tableaux vivants—a favorite pursuit of the Biedermeier period” (173). 14 Andrea Krauss develops this concept in her essay “Rahmenschau: Scenes of Observation in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Des Vetters Eckfenster.” 15 Claudia Liebrand observes the following in regard to the binoculars in Hoffmann’s oeuvre: “Zugleich ist das Fernglas im Hoffmannschen Oeuvre spätestens seit dem Sandmann ein technisches Medium, das als Katalysator für den imaginativen und fiktionalisierenden Zugriff auf die Welt fungiert” (192, “At the same time the binoculars, have been in Hoffmann’s oeuvre at the latest since the Sandman, a technical medium which functions as a catalyst for the imaginative and fictionalized access to the world”). 16 According to Krauss “two ways of seeing meet: one divides the intransparent mass scene into clear segments with the help of a ‘glass’ and describes them true to detail, the other absorbs this material and synthesizes it in his productive imagination” (408). 17 “It is not that the cousin possesses a keener power of observation than the narrator. As soon as the cousin has directed the narrator’s vision to the particular events of the marketplace below, the narrator demonstrates a remarkable eye for detail. The difference, however, is in the manner in which the two

154  Joseph D. Rockelmann cousins relate what they see to each other. The narrator describes exactly what happens, following the movements and actions of the people he observes. His account is in detailed, broken sentences in which the real time of the action corresponds directly to the narrated time. The cousin takes what the narrator has observed, interprets it, and turns it into a narrated account which goes far beyond what the eye sees. He allows his imagination to play with his visual perceptions and creates a story full of intrigue and human interest” (Cook 423). 18 Byrd indicates that “by harnessing this exteriority, the older cousin and the younger one transmit a pedagogy of observing modern city life and put it into practice in their city literature. The use of framework narrative, dialogue structure, and the cousin’s disagreements on how to fictionalize the scenes they are seeing through the apartment window foregrounds acts of aesthetic production and vision with the panoramic experience. A panoramic point of view becomes a key plot element in the creation of urban literature” (Pedagogy of Observation 106–07). 19 This brings to mind Benjamin’s thoughts on crowds; Benjamin believes that people who just live amongst the crowd resemble automatons and “Bergson’s fictitious characters who have completely liquidated their memories” (178). 20 Mihaela Bancila points out “… one needs the help of the faculty of imagination to compensate for the deficient gaze of the eye. It is this ‘eye of the mind,’ the invalid tells his visitor, that augments his gaze and helps him hypothesize the diverse life of the bourgeois individuals at the market” (35). 21 Hoffmann’s text demonstrates wonderfully that “Wahrnehmung und Imagination sind ebenso verschwistert wie Wirklichkeit und Phantasie” (Eicher 376; “perception and imagination are related just as reality and fantasy are” [my translation]). 22 Juergen Straub points out that “[v]irtually all contemporary theories assume that memory does not simply preserve and retrieve on demand the “information” which once was put in and stored there. An active memory reconstructs the past and history from the standpoint of the present and in light of certain future expectations” (222). 23 Krauss accurately describes the fusion of two types of seeing in the text which lead to “wirkliches schauen.” “In a marital alliance-the final part shows both protagonists in an intimate embrace—two ways of seeing meet: one divides the intransparent mass scene into clear segments with the help of a “glass” and describes them true to detail, the other absorbs this material and synthesizes it in his productive imagination” (Krauss 408). 24 Schacter reports that “some researchers have adopted the view that memory for emotionally traumatic events is accurately preserved—perhaps forever— in great detail, and therefore differs fundamentally from memory for nonemotional events, which is subject to decay and distortion” (205). 25 Cook makes a valid point when he states, “it admonishes that, as social evolution proceeds, the writer must also learn to see with new eyes” (433). Alexander Schultz makes an interesting observation in regard to what the imminent death of the older cousin symbolizes in his article. “The cousin’s imminent death is hence not meant to mirror Hoffmann’s own, but is rather emblematic of the death of a worldview no longer adequate to grasp the emerging realities of nineteenth-century industrialized urbanity” (112).

Works Cited Bancila, Mihaela. The Writer’s Eye: On Vision in Hoffmann, Hoffmannsthal and Musil. 2002. University of Virginia, PhD dissertation.

Memory Embellishments  155 Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations: Essays and Reflections. New York: Schocken Books, 1985. Breithaupt, Fritz. “The Invention of Trauma in German Romanticism.” Critical Inquiry 31.1 (2005): 77–101. Bruner, Jerome. Actual Minds, Possible Worlds. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1986. Byrd, Vance. “Regarding the Cousin: Surveillance and Narration in Hoffmann’s Des Vetters Eckfenster.” German Studies Review 35.2 (2012): 249–64. ———. A Pedagogy of Observation: Nineteenth-century Panoramas, German Literature, and Reading Culture. Lewisburg: Bucknell UP, 2017. Cook, Roger. “Reader Response and Authorial Strategies: E.T.A. Hoffmann’s View from ‘Des Vetters Eckfenster.’” German Study Review 12.3 (1989): 421–35. Cometa, Michele. “Framing in Crisis. Literature and Optical Devices in the Age of Hoffmann.” Archaologies of Visual Culture: Gazes, Optical Devices and Images from 17th to 20th Century Literature. Ed. Valeria Cammarata, Michele Cometa, and Roberta Coglitore. Göttingen: V & R unipress, 2016. 121–205. Daemmrich, Horst. The Shattered Self: E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Tragic Vision. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 1973. Darby, David. “The Unfettered Eye: Glimpsing Modernity from E. T. A. Hoffmann’s Corner Window.” Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Geistesgeschichte 77.2 (2003): 274–94. Eicher, Thomas. “‘Mit einem Blick das ganze Panorama des grandiosen Platzes’: Panoramische Strukturen in Des Vetters Eckfenster von E.T.A. Hoffmann.” Poetica 25.3–4 (1993): 360–77. Elkins, James. The Object Stares Back: On the Nature of Seeing. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996. Hoffmann, E.T.A. “Des Vetters Eckfenster.” Sämtliche Werke. 6 vols. Ed. Gerhard Allroggen, Hartmut Steinecke, Wulf Segebrecht, and Ursula Segebrecht. Frankfurt-am-Main: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985–2004; vol. 6, Späte Prosa, Briefe, Tagebücher und Aufzeichnungen, juristische Schriften: Werke 1814-1822. Ed. Gerhard Allroggen, et al. Bibliothek deutscher Klassiker 185. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 2004. 468–97. ———. “My Cousin’s Corner Window.” The Golden Pot and Other Tales. Trans. Ritchie Robertson. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008. 377–401. Krauss, Andrea. “Rahmenschau: Scenes of Observation in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Des Vetters Eckfenster.” Montatshefte 105.3 (2013): 407–25. Lessing, G.E. “Laokoon oder über die Grenzen zwischen Malerei und Poesie.” Werke und Briefe. Ed. Wilfried Barner et al. Vol. 5/2. Frankfurt a. M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985–2003. 9–206. ———. Laocoön: An Essay on the Limits of Painting and Poetry. Trans. Edward Allen McCormick. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins UP, 1984. Liebrand, Claudia. “Des Vetters Eckfenster.” E.T.A. Hoffmann-Handbuch: Leben – Werk – Wirkung. Ed. Christine Lubkoll and Harald Neumeyer. Berlin und Heidelberg: J.B. Metzler’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 2015. 191–93. Poe, Edgar Allen. “The Man of the Crowd.” Edgar Allen Poe: Selected Poetry and Tales. Ed. James M. Hutchisson. Buffalo, NY: Broadview Press, 2012. 225–34. Richardson, Alan. “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Fiction.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. 277–96.

156  Joseph D. Rockelmann Schacter, Daniel. Searching for Memory: The Brain, the Mind, and the Past. New York: Basic Books, 1996. Schlutz, Alexander. “E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Marketplace Vision of Berlin.” Romanticism and the City. Ed. Larry H. Peer. New York: Palgrave, 2011. 105–34. Shorter, Edward. From Paralysis to Fatigue: A History of Psychosomatic Illness in the Modern Era. New York: The Free Press, 1992. Solso, Richard. Cognition and Visual Arts. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1994. Straub, Juergen. “Psychology, Narrative, and Cultural Memory: Past and Present.” A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies. Ed. Astrid Erll and Ansgar Nünning. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010. 215–28.

7 Images for Memories From Ekphrasis to Excess of Memory in German Romantic Literature Beate I. Allert

…it has been claimed that the ability to comprehend images is linked to memory itself. (James Elkins, Visual Studies 137)

7.1 Introduction and Thesis Ekphrasis, or simply a verbal description of something visual,1 has been commonly employed in texts from Antiquity through the Enlightenment and down to the present. This concept is not only used to designate any verbal description of a previously existing visual work, a statue or a painting, but it also points to the visualizing of texts or to imagined things that are being evoked in the reading process and via cognition and fantasy such as the description of the shield of Achilles in book 18 of Homer’s Iliad, thus bringing to a reader’s awareness ancient battles or actions involving intricate encounters that cannot be translated and described in detail.2 These visualizations are to some extent open to speculation and imagination and question the act of seeing. As my epigraph above indicates, the ability to understand images is intricately linked to memory; and it is not only the purview of any art historian, but also of anyone trying to understand literature and culture. Moreover, it concerns the interpretation of dreams, poems, stories, and anything we see. It may ultimately depend, at least to some extent, on our own imagination, beliefs, desires, and the unconscious. Looking is hoping, desiring, never just taking in light, never really collecting patterns or data. Looking is possessing or the desire to possess—we eat food, we own objects, and we “possess” bodies— and there is no looking without thoughts of using, possessing, repossessing, owning, fixing, appropriating, keeping, remembering, and commemorating, cherishing, borrowing, and stealing, I cannot look at anything—any object, any person—without a shadow of thought of possessing that thing. Those appetites don’t just accompany looking: they are looking itself. (Elkins 22) DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-10

158  Beate I. Allert One may be skeptical and also add, however, that sometimes what is seen is not only what is desired, but also what is feared. And when the “shield” or the ekphrasis debate is mentioned, it has inevitably to do with battles in the past, conflicts, or fights. Images, figures, or artworks may critically reflect not only on the observer, each time differently, but also on broader societal contexts. They reference other images, figures, literature, and artworks. Among the first to explore the notion of the unconscious was the German Romantic writer Johann Paul Friedrich Richter (Jean Paul) (1763–1825), who associated “das Unbewußte” with an inner dark continent within the human soul which he also called “inneres Afrika.”3 But often such matters have become so deeply inscribed in cultural memory through historical transmissions of whatever kind that just mentioning an image, or looking at such an icon, may trigger an entire story or evoke well-known allegory, as in the famous description of the Mona Lisa by Walter Pater (1839–1894): She is older than the rocks on which she sits; like the vampire, she has been dead many times, and learned secrets of the grave; and has been a diver in deep seas, and keeps their fallen day about her; and trafficked for strange webs with Eastern merchants, and, as Leda, was the mother of Helen of Troy, and, as Saint Anne, the mother of Mary; and all this has been to her but as the sound of lyres and flutes, and lives only in the delicacy with which it has molded the changing lineaments, and tinged the eyelids and the hands.4 (79) Such an evocative artwork as the Mona Lisa has apparently the ability to make the observers feel a certain sense of insecurity and question their own readings of the picture. I argue that it is perhaps the signs of any great artwork or literary text, and also of any significant place on the map, that they make us experience what we see. There are unconscious thoughts that are being triggered by images. In this essay I shall offer some insights into the reading of images in German Romantic literature and culture, with respect to the figures of the Loreley5 (various spellings), Venus, and Pygmalion, especially the Loreley poems of Clemens Brentano (1778–1842), Joseph von Eichendorff (1788–1857), and Heinrich Heine (1797–1856). Against a certain typology of interpretation that put these images on pedestals, so to speak, and gave them meanings associated with an attractive yet dangerous femininity and a destructive gaze, I shall challenge such standard readings and follow James Elkin’s important idea that the images may stare back as already Heine must have noticed. I shall further suggest that such agency of the visual is not only a modern notion but something that can already be deciphered as expected, detected, and critically questioned in the literature and culture of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Images for Memories  159

7.2 Positioning in Ekphrasis Scholarship Murray Krieger has argued that Homer’s description of the shield of Achilles is in effect a “reverse ekphrasis,” since it seeks in the visual arts to produce an equivalent to the verbal text, instead of the other way around. In any case, ekphrasis has to do with the so-called “sister Arts” as Horace phrased it, the relations between the visual and the verbal, and the dynamics between them. Whether there can be a successful transfer from one medium into another, from images to texts, or vice versa, we have learned from Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729–1781) that disciplines matter and that even if some paintings can be well described visually, or narratives evoke stark images, they are limited to remain within the boundaries of their specific medium and with respect to their position in relation to spatial and temporal dimensions. Whereas Lessing aligned the visual primarily to the spatial and the acoustic to the temporal, the verbal connects with both in multiple ways.6 In the contexts of the Loreley motif both seeing and hearing play a role. As Krieger puts it, “ekphrasis is a picture-making capacity of words in poems, except that from the first that capacity was to be challenged by the obvious fact that words are many other things but are not—and happily are not—pictures and no do not, even illusionarily, have ‘capacity’” (1–2). Ekphrasis theorists have dismantled the notion that there was ever an easy transfer from images to texts. German Romantic literature provides abundant examples of miscommunications when images are falsely taken to be the real thing, or when words are read as if they must be taken literally when in fact they were merely to be understood contextually, matters of metaphor, or metonymy. Ekphrasis initially builds on the assumption that images can become verbalized, and the visual can be successfully transferred into the verbal. Images carry memories of something seen or visualized, some residue of the power of the image, even if they are merely textual representations of the visual. This idea of transformation or translation from one medium to another, the visual into the verbal, becomes complicated in the eighteenth century, not only in the Laokoon debate from Lessing to Herder and Goethe, but even more so in the context of German Romanticism.7 It was a credo of German Romanticism, and especially of the philosopher Fichte, that one should “romanticize the world” via poetic language, but as Novalis put it succinctly in his Lehrlinge zu Sais, one must be very careful with taking such poetic images literally or out of context. It is a feature of the successful poet to be able to read figures in nature as if they belonged to a large “Chiffrenschrift” (“hieroglyphics”), so that visual phenomena seem to be interrelated and fit a decipherable context in certain moments, whether the image may be the pattern on wings of birds, on eggshells, in clouds, crystals, snow, rocks,

160  Beate I. Allert or in any other manifestations of nature. But after this fleeting moment of understanding, the meaning dissolves once again, and all returns to indecipherability and enigma: Ein Alcahest scheint über die Sinne der Menschen ausgegossen zu sein. Nur augenblicklich scheinen ihre Wünsche, ihre Gedanken, sich zu verdichten. So entstehen ihre Ahndungen, aber nach kurzen Zeiten schwimmt alles wieder, wie vorher, vor ihren Blicken. (Novalis, 1:201) It is as though an alkahest had been poured over the senses of man. Only at moments do their desires and thoughts seem to solidify. Thus arise their presentiments, but after a short time everything swims again before their eyes. (The Novices of Sais 3–4)8 In certain instances, not only artworks but one’s actual reality can be described verbally in a process of ekphrasis; reality presents itself as art, whether it may be a “real” object, an authentic scene from life, or only what we see with the inner vision of our mind. In Romanticism the imagination gained new currency and asserts what W.J.T. Mitchell and Stephen Cheeke call “ekphrastic hope.”9 Yet the risk of projections and hallucinations also arises, and I shall argue that the reception of the Loreley story in the era of Romanticism illustrates examples of ekphrastic fear due to either moments of ignored and forgotten memory or due to what may be an excess of memory, or an erasure of critical reflection. Much of the literature of German Romanticism draws attention to problems that have to do not only with ekphrasis but also with an excess of memory. They can, as Heine describes, barely be shed or let go; they are like riddles and persistent murmurs of unresolved stories, cultural baggage that is related to multiple senses, coexisting but possibly being misread so far. As in the Loreley story which is the retelling of certain fatal accidents, misguided admiration, and false accusations. This iconic song surpasses the ancient myth and shifts focus from individual agents to more anonymous powers.

7.3 On the Dangers of (Self-)Reflection and Memory Loss When the young man in Heinrich von Kleist’s “Über das Marionettentheater” positioned his foot on a stool, the observer and he himself were reminded of the Hellenistic bronze, “Boy with Thorn.”10 The observer jokes that it was probably a coincidence, and the boy tries to repeat the same movement which he is unable to do despite numerous attempts. He had “seine Unschuld verloren, und das Paradies derselben” (DKV, 3:560; “lost his innocence and Paradise itself”).11 The conflation of art and

Images for Memories  161 reality, as had transpired here, was fatal for the transmission of an inner vision in one that is directed outward, since self-reflection interfered. What happened in this instant is that art had not only imitated reality but replaced it. As can be seen in many German Romantic narratives, there are often artworks and ekphrastic descriptions of landscapes which themselves are now regarded as works of art. They involve narrative structures that are often complex. If we compare texts from early to late German Romanticism, we find, for example, the reception of earlier images and described icons as preserved sets of images evoking earlier artworks, legends, and myths. These provoke fear or pleasure, bliss in recognition, or iconophobia, an intense fear of the impact of visuality. As Frederick Burwick has pointed out: The poet, by representing the work of a painter or sculptor, is offering us a mimesis of a mimesis which pretends to be externally directed, even when it is not: Homer never saw the shield of Achilles; Keats’ Grecian Urn existed only in his own imagination. But when the poet looks upon an actual artifact, the verbal translation forces a self-reflexive scrutiny. Ekphrasis requires attention to the presumptions and pitfalls of the artistic endeavor. (107–8) In particular, attention was given to how to visually depict the most poignant moment in an entire action, such as in the long narrative. Viewing an image or a sculpture and “reading” the meaning of that image or sculpture is not the same as reading a written text. Memory often serves a disruptive function in German Romantic texts, for example in Tieck’s Der blonde Eckbert, in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Der Sandmann, or in Jean Paul’s Der Komet. It gains an agency much more than in any of the literature of the earlier periods of Storm and Stress, Empfindsamkeit, or the Enlightenment. We can trace a paradigm shift, as noted by Schiller, from the naïve to the sentimental age.12 The philosophical and aesthetic discourses in Germany during the era of the Enlightenment claimed a dominance of the eyes over all the other senses until the Laokoon debate with Lessing, Herder, and Goethe and the movements of Empfindsamkeit and Storm and Stress drew attention to other senses, especially the ears and hands. The shift from the visual to the acoustic and the tactile is accompanied by a new discovery of the importance of memory in the process of cognition and Gestalt formation. There are subtle but significant changes from Lessing’s notion of “Augenblick,” the momentary glance that contracts an entire action into one single and separate moment in the representation of the artwork, to Herder’s notion of “Anblick,” which is associated with a lasting, reflecting gaze. The latter involves a mode of absorption, a forgetting of time, for the sake of

162  Beate I. Allert integrating memories and creating a “feeling” as Herder would call it, a synesthetic whole. Goethe added his own idea, calling attention to memory of what he recalls as the experiencing of a vital “Lebenspunkt,” a lived experience in the present, as mediated and preserved in an artwork. However, there may be another paradigm shift to notice later, when in the literature of Romanticism such points are no longer associated with ekphrastic hope but rather its failure or loss. It was Schiller already who in his essay “On Naïve and Sentimental Poetry” precipitated a critique of nature, culture, and perception that was essential, not only in the debate between the ancients and the moderns, but moreover as a key to the experience that memory no longer blends into the temporality of the here and now. He argued that it is not a preservation of preexisting memories that matters but rather the creation of new memory images through reflection. The process of thinking precedes and filters emotions and sense perceptions. Even more so, flashes of memory can disrupt daily events and the habitual use of language and make the poet realize that whatever experience is being described, it is already removed and processed through language in such a way that immediacy vanishes. Whatever may have been “naïve” or an undivided sense of “Gefühl” (“feeling”) may have been a matter of belief for Storm and Stress poets earlier, but it is a trait of the moderns to challenge images and sense perceptions as something that is most likely already removed from any notion of undivided, and hence unique and unquestionable, sensuality. Memory has gained a key valence in the context of German Romantic literature. Related debates are not limited to images versus sounds but also address matters of taste, smell, and touch, the conglomerates of multiple sense perceptions. We may already think of Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu, where the treatment of memory comes about as a result of the fragrance of a madeleine dipped in tea. There is also the problem of individual sense perceptions versus all-embracing nature that can ultimately no longer be understood in any concrete way which can already be seen in the context of Goethe’s “Erlkönig” and even more so in the Romantic Loreley poems. Memory cannot be conquered and invaded without repercussions. And within the development from early to late German Romanticism, the relationship between seeing and ekphrasis gets increasingly complicated and the role of memory becomes even more a matter of concern.

7.4 Loreley in Ekphrasis Studies What interests me in the context of this chapter is, among other things, the question of how today’s ekphrasis studies may help to unravel the cultural memories associated with certain images or icons of German Romanticism, or how this literature may further improve ekphrastic tools. In at least one case a geographical feature rather than literary tradition or inscribed iconology underlies such a situation: the “Loreley Rock”

Images for Memories  163 headland on the Middle Rhine. On one level of discourse, “Loreley” is a certain geographical space on the map, on another level, it is a female figure associated with the location, depicted as sitting high up on the rock near the river, drawing attention to the image of herself in the landscape. There are versions of the story claiming that she is able to bewitch and cast spells on the onlooker(s) and that they then become distracted, no longer able to navigate their boat safely on the river, enter the current of the stream and lose control, having to navigate the swirling water between the rocks, fall in, and drown. The tale immediately confronts the audience with the questions: is the cause of the sailors’ misfortune spelled out in the legend? Whose fault is it and what does memory have to do with it? How do the legends change and how are such changes to be interpreted? The figure of the Loreley is not like the Mona Lisa or Venus, a figure of ancient or traditional folk narrative. It first appeared in print in 1801 in the poem “Zu Bacharach am Rheine,” by Clemens Brentano in the second volume of his novel Godwi oder das steinerne Bild der Mutter, a work in which the image of the mother is very attractive but also dangerously luring.13 The poem begins with the lines: “At Bacharach on the Rhine / Lives an enchantress / She was so beautiful and elegant / And broke many hearts / And ruined many men around her / From her bonds of love / there was no rescue (my own translation).”14 The spectators had an admiration for an image that then came alive, but then to the horror of these spectators turned out as an example of failed memory, merely a culturally inscribed icon, and ultimately dangerous or even fatal. In the novel, the poem is a song, sung by the character Violette. Her account is not about a female figure luring fishermen to disaster, thereby comparing her to an evil “Hexe” (“witch”); instead, her tale is about a young woman who happens to have the effect of a “Zauberin” (“magician”) on others who are drawn to her, although she is interested only in mourning her lost love. She has become a victim of her lover who has betrayed her and of those who did not offer her any help in her sorrow and grieving. When she turned to the bishop for support and protection, he accused her of witchcraft. Instead of executing her as she asked him to do, he told her to enter a nunnery located in complete isolation. She then requests once more to take her favorite hike, high up on the mountain that borders the Rhine, in order to see the castle in which her lover has vanished. That wish is granted and upon reaching the summit, the “Jungfrau” looks down and says: “Da gehet / Ein Schifflein auf dem Rhein, / Der in dem Schifflein stehet / Der soll mein Liebster sein” (429; “There goes a little boat on the Rhine, / The one who stands in that boat / He must be my beloved” [my own translation]). She imagines that these must be fishermen and one of them her lover. She gazes down, loses control, and falls to her death. The three knights who accompany her also die. In this version Brentano exhibits compassion for the demise of the woman and her companions. It was she who was wronged.

164  Beate I. Allert In Brentano’s “Rheinmärchen,” first published in 1846, the figure has, however, become the “Lureley,” a young woman at the center of several narratives.15 In “Das Märchen von dem Hause Starenberg und das Ahnen des Müllers Radlauf” she is introduced by an implied narrator, the Miller Radlauf, who, however, does not intervene or have any agency in the course of events.16 Despite this new ambivalence or indifference by the narrator, his version of the story takes an interesting twist. It is told from the perspective from within the rocking boat. Während dem schwankte unser Schiff immer heftiger, und die Stare, das Wetter scheuend, stiegen mit lautem Geschrei in die Höhe und stürzten durch die noch schwärzere Luft nach dem Ufer; wir waren in diesem Augenblicke einigen Felsen sehr nah, zwischen welchen der See einen heftigen Wirbel bildet, und indem die rudernden Knappen von denselben mit Gewalt ablenken wollten, schrien sie laut auf: “Ei sieh da! da ist die schöne Hexe wieder, die uns so lang schlafen gemacht.” Ich wendete meine Augen nach dem Fels, da sah ich eine wunderschöne junge Frau sitzen; ganz schwarz ihr Röcklein, weiß ihr Schleier, blond ihre Haare, und in tiefster Trauer; sie weinte heftig, und kämmte ihre langen Haare. Die Knappen aber hörten nicht auf, sie zu verhöhnen; da ward der Sturm immer heftiger; das Schiff ward mitten in den Strudel geworfen und begann sich wie eine Spindel zu drehen. (Brentano, 3:120) Meanwhile our ship swayed more and more, and the starlings, afraid of the weather, rose with loud screeching up high, and they fell through the darkening air in the direction of the shore; we were at this moment very close to some rocks, between which the lake formed a violent vortex, and while the boys at the oars tried with great effort to draw away from them, they screamed loudly: “Hey, look at that! There is the beautiful witch again, which made us sleep for such a long time.” I directed my eyes to the rock. There I saw a beautiful young woman; completely black her little skirt, white her veil, blond her hair, and she was in deepest mourning; she wept bitterly and combed her long hair.17 The lads did not stop to make fun of her; then the storm became more violent; the ship was thrown into the middle of the maelstrom and began to turn like a spindle. (my translation) The narrator does not intervene when the young woman gets ridiculed and made into a spectacle; he does not protect her from the rude lads. He is shown as a symbol of indifference, non-intervention, and cold reflection. This female figure is possibly identified as being the same as the woman in the poem from Godwi identified as “schöne Hexe.” Notably, the situation

Images for Memories  165 on the river grows worse. The narrator appears to be drawn along with his fellow lads deep into the water. After a blackout, he finds himself conscious again among bull-rushes, coral trees, and waterlilies. He gets immersed in the fiction as a participant. To his surprise, he sees seven sorrowful maidens sitting on lily pads surrounding Madam Lureley, “dasselbe holdselige Weib, das ich auf dem Felsen gesehen hatte als unser Boot unterging” (3:121; “the same blessed lady I had seen on the rock just when our boat flipped”).18 Attention is drawn to the Loreley figure combing her hair. This image is not only objectified, but it also gains agency. We may well consider it as Brentano’s innovation to introduce this idea which will capture the imagination of subsequent artists and writers. In addition to his poem “Zu Bacharach am Rheine,” Brentano refers to the Loreley in the poems “Am Rheine schweb ich hin und her,” “Nachklänge Beethovenscher Musik,” and “Wenn der Sturm das Meer umschlinget” (Brentano, Werke, vol. 1, 128–29, 308–11, 45–49). His ideas were connected to those of the Jena philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814), who argued in “Die Bestimmung des Menschen” that there is a certain reliability of various sense perceptions that may be considered. Fichte proclaims: So glaube ich nunmehr einen guten Teil der Welt, die mich umgibt, zu kennen; und ich habe in der Tat Mühe und Sorgfalt genug darauf verwendet. Nur der übereinstimmenden Aussage meiner Sinne, nur der beständigen Erfahrung, habe ich Glauben zugestellt; ich habe betastet, was ich erblickt, ich habe zerlegt, was ich betastet habe, ich habe meine Beobachtungen wiederholt, und mehrmals wiederholt; ich habe die verschiedenen Erfahrungen unter einander verglichen; und nur nachdem ich ihren genauen Zusammenhang einsah, nachdem ich eine aus der anderen erklären und ableiten, und den Erfolg im Voraus berechnen konnte, und die Wahrnehmung des Erfolgs meiner Berechnung entsprach, habe ich mich beruhigt. Dafür bin ich nun auch der Richtigkeit dieses Teils meiner Erkenntnisse so sicher, als meines eigenen Daseins, schreite mit festem Tritte in der mir bekannten Sphäre meiner Welt einher, und wage in jedem Augenblicke Dasein und Wohlsein auf die Untrüglichkeit meiner Überzeugungen. (1:219) So, I believe to know a good portion of the world that surrounds me; and I have spent great effort and care to do so. Only the synchronizing results of my various senses, only consistent experiences did I give credence to; I have touched what I saw, dissected what I touched, I have repeated my observations, and repeated them again; I have compared the various experiences among themselves; and only after understanding their precise connectivity, after I was able to explain and deduce one from the other, and after I could anticipate the result

166  Beate I. Allert correctly and find it analogous to my calculations, then was I content. Therefore, I am now as certain of these experiences as I am of my own being, move with firm steps in the world of my known sphere and dare to trust in each moment of being and welfare, based on my unmistakable convictions. (my translation) Whereas Fichte proclaims a certain sense of belonging and wellbeing in the world and trusts his experiences as being correct, he cannot avoid raising additional questions about the illusionary quality of reality itself. Images and conflicting sense perceptions undercut this firm belief. His Wissenschaftslehre is an attempt at understanding nature by acknowledging the dependency of all perceptions on the processes of cognition themselves. He challenges, even more than already Immanuel Kant had done, the notion of objectivity and turns attention to the productivity of the mind. The human self or individual is so insignificant in the cosmos that no efforts would suffice to show the individual’s place adequately on any map. He asks: “Aber—was bin ich selbst, und was ist meine Bestimmung? Überflüssige Frage. Es ist schon lange her, daß meine Belehrung über diesen Gegenstand geschlossen ist” (Fichte, 1:219; “But—what am I myself, and what is my destiny? Superfluous question. It has been a long time since I completed my treatise about this topic”). Fichte defines the individual as being at the center of the universe and proclaims ultimate subjectivity as an answer, as if these distinct sense perceptions would ultimately all match up. He proposes that subjectivity and inter-subjectivity are in full recognition and power. We can see traces of this approach in Brentano’s poem “Zu Bacharach am Rheine” where events in the poem are told in such a way that the enchanting female figure is the actual agent and can be blamed for the demise of these fishermen, including the narrator. His account may indicate a hint of pity for her since it was she who had been wronged first. Her misery then causes the misery of others, and the story seems to illustrate a culturally engrained gender conflict as crucial for the Loreley legend over time. A collective memory gets simply adopted and passed on as if it were an objective one.

7.5 Turning from Above to Below with Heine A more compassionate version of the narrative appears in a poem later called “Die Lore-Ley” (“Ich weiß nicht, was soll es bedeuten”) (“I don’t know, what this should mean”) by Heinrich Heine which first appeared in 1827 without a title as the second poem in the sequence, “Die Heimkehr (“The Return”).”19 The poem begins with the notion of not knowing: “Ich weiß nicht, was soll es bedeuten, / Daß ich so traurig bin; / Ein Märchen aus alten Zeiten, / Das kommt mir nicht aus dem Sinn” (1:49;

Images for Memories  167 “I don’t know what this should mean / that I am so sad; / A fairy tale from times long past / I can’t get it out of my mind”).20 It is a riddle, an echo that has no real human voice anymore which this poem brings attention to. It may imply a repressed aspect of the story, the pseudoobjectivity of the narrator. There is, we could argue, an excess of memory, something recurrent because it was repressed. According to Heine, there is something tormenting and obsessive about this Loreley memory which he simply cannot shed. We notice between the lines that Loreley is about the phenomenon of an echo, a déjà vu of something and that there are voices that have long been unhinged. There is something real that has gone missing, but something artificial persistently repeats itself. One cannot easily let go of it, whether it stems from sirens or musical instruments, from old legends, or whether it is a series of events that may have been culturally inscribed already via redundant recordings in literature. Whatever the events may have been, they are blurred under images and sounds, sonnets, or patterns, packed up as poems or narratives that have endlessly been repeated and that have an excessive recurrence, although they imply a mystery. Heine brings to the reader’s awareness that there may have been something repressed in the past, namely talking to the person Loreley directly, whoever the original of this icon may be. The point is not to blame Loreley, or any female, but to reflect on mechanisms of ignoring her while falsely appropriating her own identity in a process of looking. And why does any narrator have to resist intervention when somebody gets falsely mocked and ridiculed? He may as well drown along with the fishermen. There is the lacking agency, the puzzle of redundancy, the mimicry of falsely normalized legends that cannot be shed. In Heine’s account, the boatman is seized by his own desire, the lack of attention to the present time, and by the impact of music or other forces that are not mono-causal but require careful listening to. Instead of looking at the cliffs in the water and navigating his vessel carefully, he merely gazes upwards (“in die Höh”).21 Heine seems to parody just that. This is similar to Heine’s ballet version of the Faust legend, a text that critically exposes a problem with the Romantics: they seem to look upwards. Heine wants them to look downwards, from the clouds to the earth.22 His poem ends merely with speculation: “Ich glaube, die Wellen verschlingen / Am Ende Schiffer und Kahn; / Und das hat mit ihrem Singen / die Loreley getan” (1/1 209 ; “I believe, the waves will swallow up eventually bargeman and scow; and that the Loreley has done this with her singing”). Whereas the speaker is merely speculating about what will happen in the future (“I believe the waves will swallow up”), the outcome remains open yet clearly ominous. Whether or not Loreley has “done” anything to be blamed for or could be blamed for the death of the bargeman, this question has become in Heine’s context a matter of urgency. Similarly, in Heine’s Faust ballet—in contrast to Goethe’s Faust—there is no rescue from above but rather punishment from below. In Goethe’s

168  Beate I. Allert version, there is singing and there is the power of femininity which will, albeit in the subjunctive mode, ultimately rescue Faust despite his many transgressions and the death of Gretchen and others he has caused. In Heine’s version of Faust, there is no such rescue. Instead, the judgement comes from below, from an anonymous big hand that pulls the helpless Faust figure into the earth. He gets literally snatched away down into a hole on the stage in front of the spectators. He gets punished for his failures which primarily stem from his obsessive fixation on having falsely indulged an image. Heine writes in his critical essay “Die romantische Schuleˮ (1836): “Die Statue, die der Pygmalion verfertigt, war ein schönes Weib, sogar der Meister verliebte sich darin, sie wurde lebendig unter seinen Küssen, aber so viel wir wissen, hat sie nie Kinder bekommen” (DRS 199; “The statue which Pygmalion created was a marvelous woman, even the master fell in love with her, and she became alive under his kisses. But, as far as we know, she never had any children with himˮ).23 He reminds his readers of the fact that these icons, figures, and statues “keine Menschen sind, sondern unglückliche Mischlinge von Gottheit und Stein” (4:200; “are not human beings, but unfortunate hybrids of the divine and stone”). And vice versa, he draws attention to the human character traits, the feelings, and the sorrow these figures embody and the importance of human action accordingly. In Heine’s universe, there is no rescue from above. He critiques that the difference between humans and artifacts has been falsely ignored. He critiques idolatry, as well as complacency, and any false sense of security. He does not believe in poeticizing the world or having faith in the correct “Zauberwort” (“magic word”) to lift the spell that may have governed the Romantic era. Moreover, Heine questions dreams, myths, and legends, and must have felt rather unsettled by such stories about bewitching females and their songs that cast spells. His version of the Loreley bemoans the poets that cannot shed outdated fairy tales. It is the poet who can tell a story so that those who were wronged in history can be liberated, and false superstitions get abandoned. What Heine wanted to see, more than anything, were social and political actions for the sake of justice. His credo was: “Die Tat ist das Kind des Wortes” (4:199; “The deed is the child of the word”). As Ludwig Marcuse pointed out correctly, Heine distanced himself from the movement of Romanticism in so far as it idealized the dark Middle Ages, the class system of knights and kings. Heine challenges the perfect translatability of images into texts while drawing attention to multiple possible interpretations and by making sense of their rhythms and gaps in the use of words and sounds.24 Heine’s account of the Loreley story is a confession of sorts so that one may not necessarily have to remember all of the old stories if they clutter one’s memory and mind and prevent liberation. In fact, they are excessive. There is no female who causes the death of these fishermen, nor is it the rough current of the Rhine. It is the echo of those who call out a name and have their own voice echo back to remind them of their own agency. Heine shifts the attention to the course of action in the “here and now.”

Images for Memories  169 His approach to the motif shifts the emphasis. In Heine’s poem “Lyrisches Intermezzo” we find two contrasting verses that are key to a new interpretation of his Loreley poem: Basilisken und Vampire, Lindenwürm und Ungeheur, Solche schlimme Fabeltiere, Die erschafft des Dichters Feuer. Aber dich und deine Tücke, Und dein holdes Angesicht, Und die falschen frommen Blicke— Das erschafft der Dichter nicht. (Heine, 1:42–43) Basilisks and vampires The dragons and monsters Such horrible mythical animals The poet’s fire creates these. But you and your deceit And your lovely face And the false pious looks— That is not created by the poet.25 (my translation) In the first strophe, Heine makes the poets responsible for their creations and rejects thoughtless redundancy and false projections.26 He recognizes that, metaphorically speaking, there may be basilisks or vampires. I want to point out, however, that it is equally important that in the second verse Heine’s lyrical voice talks directly to those who may have a lovely face but are not created by the poets. He establishes a dialogue with the females who have an agency of their own. They must be acknowledged as being real. His poem questions visibility and brings to attention that outer appearances and inner truths, looks and virtues of humans, may clash. As one version of the story after another appeared in verse and prose, there was a shift of emphasis from the figure of the Loreley to a greater emphasis on uncontrollable forces as they exist in nature and society. The interpretation of the legend depends on whether the fatalities are attributed to the unfortunate girl, the helplessness of the narrator, the inattentive and easily distracted fishermen, or the force of the river associated with its speed and invisible undercurrents. The river is associated not only with the power of uncontrollable nature but also with the magic of powerful sounds of music, and the incongruence among diverse senses. The mood has changed, and the speaker appears to be puzzled and helpless. Also, Loreley is far away, the lyrical “I” removed, and she is no

170  Beate I. Allert longer an object of desire. Whatever accidents may have befallen the personae of the poem, they all seem to be projected onto her as if she were a scapegoat, the harmless yet fatal Loreley, with her songs and spells. In Heine’s version, he emphasizes an excess of memory. It is not enough to be drowning with the fishermen or for any narrator to get swallowed by the waves because they have nothing to do except to stare, to gaze at Loreley, and to look upwards. Heine draws attention to the present situation and to the difference between the imagined and the real. He commemorates earlier versions of the legend by challenging their message. Images are no longer passed on from one text to the next; they cannot be repeated or simply told. They have real content and mean something that requires ethical intervention.

7.6 Eichendorff’s Latest Versions Compared with Earlier Versions by Brentano, Tieck, and Heine Each of a series of poems by Joseph von Eichendorff, “Wünschelrute,” “Abend” (“Gestürzt sind die gold’nen Brücken”), “Die Nachtblume,” “Die wunderschöne Prinzessin,” “Der stille Grund,” “Verloren,” and “Waldgespräch,” makes distinct allusions to the Loreley and they all do it as if it were an unmistakable myth.27 In the poem “Waldgespräch” (“Forest talk”), a knight encounters a pretty woman alone in the forest. Instead of protecting or pitying her, he suddenly realizes that he is not taking his beautiful “bride” on a horse through the lonely woods. How did he think she belonged to him? Instead, in the third strophe, he all of a sudden recognizes to whom this wonderful body belongs: “Jetzt kenn ich dich—Gott steh mir bei! / Du bist die Hexe Lorelay” (Eichendorff, 1:86; “Now I know you—God stand by me! You are the witch Lorelei”). Apparently, the knight is about to or already has taken her against her will. He has never talked with her. Unexpectedly, she has suddenly gained power over the horseback-rider. The castle is now hers and she addresses the knight saying: “Du kennst mich wohl—vom hohen Stein / Schaut still mein Schloß in tiefen Rhein; / Es ist schon spät, es wird schon kalt / Kommst nimmermehr aus diesem Wald!ˮ (Eichendorff, 1:86; “You know me well—from the high rock / Quietly my castle looks into the river / It is already late, it is getting cold / you will never ever leave this forest!”).28 The poem ends with a hint that neither the rider nor the woman (perhaps a victim herself?) may be able to leave the forest ever again. It remains unclear what exactly has happened. The closing words of the poem are ominous and predict something uncanny. They suggest that the knight has violated the girl. Perhaps he is considering or already attempting to take her along as if she were his bride. He, the rider, or the impersonated lyrical self, may now be Death impersonated. There may be revenge or a consequential justice in the story, but it is not spelled out. The rider in the forest becomes afraid when he realizes that the person he

Images for Memories  171 wants to take along on his horse is in fact “die Hexe Lorelay.” He remembers that she can cast spells and has power. The recognition of this masquerade may indicate his own loss of control, even his punishment and imminent death. Eichendorff’s poem, “Die wunderliche Prinzessin,” opens with a “Zaub’rinn schöne” (“beautiful enchantress”) who lives in a castle on the mountain and who by her “wunderbare Sagen” (“wonderful legends”) draws multiple knights towards her. They remain immobile in the courtyard sitting by a round table, covered with dust and wounds: “Heinrich liegt auf seinem Löwen” (“Heinrich is lying on his lion”), “Gottfried,” “Siegfried der Scharfe,” “König Alfred, eingeschlafen / Über seiner goldnen Harfe” (“King Alfred has gone to sleep over his golden harp”), and “Don Quixot’ hoch auf der Mauer” (“Don Quixote, high on the wall”). The iconic knights were attracted there and are correlated by means of “fremde Töne” (“strange sounds”). The figures ultimately drown due to their own “Wahnsinn” (“madness”). It is not due to admiration and love but “nach langem Streiten” (1:140–41; “after lengthy fighting”). The Princess, forever young, is trapped inside the castle. When she looks over the wall and attracts suitors, the old warriors defend her and turn all of the new arrivals into toys for her old male guardian to play with. The new arrivals protest: “Jäger sind wir nicht, noch Ritter / … / Spiel nur war das—wir sind Dichter!” (Eichendorff, 1:145; “Hunters we are not, nor knights /… / It was only a game—we are Poets”). The “Zaub’rin” in the poem may continue to play and sing for many years, but she will always remain lonely and by herself. The figures that surround her are merely artificial toys, not real humans. In the poem “Der stille Grund,” an observer sees what appears to be a rudderless boat on the river: “Ein Kahn wohl sah ich ragen, / Doch niemand der es lenkt, / Das Ruder war zerschlagen, / Das Schifflein halb versenkt” (Eichendorff, 1:323; “I saw a barge looming / But nobody is in control / The rudder was broken, / the boat half sunken”). He then sees a mermaid, a female water creature believing she is alone, plaiting her golden hair, and singing beautifully. “Eine Nixe auf dem Steine / Flocht dort ihr goldnes Haar / Sie meint’, sie wär’ alleine / Und sang so wunderbarˮ (Eichendorff, 1:323; “A mermaid on the rock / Was braiding there her golden hair / She thought she was alone / and sang so wondrously”). The poem does not make any causal connection between the wrecked boat and the mermaid’s singing yet closes with the remark that it was the sound of her voice that had attracted the narrator. “Verloren” describes in the first verse how many ships pass by a “Riff” (“reef”) during the night. The narrator claims there is a “Meerfei” (“water spirit”) who “kämmt ihr Haar am Riff” (“combs her hair in the reef”) and sings from the islands that have sunk here in the sea (Eichendorff,

172  Beate I. Allert 1:427). The next strophe states that in the morning, neither a fairy nor a reef are to be seen, but the ships are sunk, and the sailors drowned. Eichendorff makes the point that language is incapable of offering any explanation for what has happened. In contrast to Brentano’s ballad, in which the maiden looks down from the rock into the river valley or the fishermen gaze up at her from below, Eichendorff’s “Nachtblume” sets the essentially acoustic images into the natural environment: he compares the night to a quiet ocean, which renders the sorrows of love like the “linden Wellenschlagen” (“faint murmurings of waves”). The poem draws the reader’s attention not only to the objects seen, but to the mind, to processes of imperfect cognition. Dreams appear visualized as clouds: “Wünsche wie die Wolken sind, / Schiffen durch die stillen Räume, / Wer erkennt im lauen Wind / Ob’s Gedanken oder Träume?ˮ (Eichendorff, 1: 299; “Wishes are like the clouds / sailing like ships through silent space / who discerns in the warm wind / whether they are thoughts or dreams?ˮ). Nature, as it appears, reflects on humans interacting with it and may ultimately be impossible to understand. Yet harmony seems to be maintained since what is seen appears only from a distance. Eichendorff and Heine offer divergent views. The former, a devout Catholic, made peace with the reality that presented itself to him and his poems are filled with naïve innocence and childlike wonder, although something uncanny and unresolved nevertheless remains, even in his account of Loreley. Heine proved not only skeptical of the entire “Romantic School” to which he used to belong, he also drew attention to a self-induced melancholy of the poet. He begins, at least in his second strophe of the poem, a dialogue with the person Loreley in a way no other poet had done before. She is no more a figment of the poetic mind but has personal agency, whether good or bad. And it is the poets’ turn to pay attention not only to what is above but to what used to be below. Heine paved the way for the movement Junges Deutschland and drew attention to problems in society, be they matters of class, gender, or the belief in unearthly powers that come to rescue one. He shares the boatman’s desire to believe in dialogue with someone, listening to songs and memories, yet also taking a proactive stance to avoid calamity.

7.7 Ekphrastic Conclusions As Lessing’s Laokoon already illustrated most famously, images or artworks are at their best or most effective when they succeed according to the motto: “Je mehr wir sehen, desto mehr müssen wir hinzu denken können” (DKV 5/2, 32; “The more we see, the more we must be able to imagine” [Laocoon 17]). If they are not overly detailed or prescriptive, if they leave enough space to the imagination of the recipients, then they may be most memorable. For example, Lessing attributes to a poem by Dryden the idea that it is actually a “musical painting,” something a brush on a canvas could not have produced this effectively.29 Visuality is

Images for Memories  173 a matter of literature being equal to the visual arts, a matter of space and time. The signs of the visual arts appear in a spatial or horizontal sequence (räumliches Nebeneinander), whereas the signs of music appear simultaneously, or layered (zeitliches Aufeinander). The language of poetry (“Dichtung”) must borrow its signs (“Zeichen”) both from painting and from music and participate both in the spatial and temporal dimensions to which they each belong. “Dichtung,” or poetic writing, is located in a tension between these two distinct disciplines of art (Lessing, Laokoon FA 5/2, 140).30 Lessing asserted that the signs of sculpture or painting are bodies (“Körper”) in space (“Raum”) and that the signs of music are sounds (“Töne”) in time. It is the advantage of music to express multiple signs at the same time, whereas in the visual realm the artist must select the one single “prägnanter Augenblick” (“poignant or pregnant moment”) that condenses the entire action. The poet must similarly attempt to follow a principle of reduction or use a minimalist style to do justice to the imagination of the reader. Yet they cannot do so without the layering of signs as music does in order to contract the temporal into the visual. I have suggested in this essay that in Heine’s poem the Loreley motif is contextualized so that it may indicate an excess of memory. The sadness of the poet, the fact that he cannot shed the memory of the Loreley legends, may have to do not only with the visual and its endless attraction, but—its “other,” so to speak—the unresolved and invisible residues of the real: the flux of time. Whatever it is, it needs to be newly contextualized in the cultural history of the present. And it will be the task of memory to bring these dimensions together synchronically. Various approaches to Laokoon and strategies for ekphrasis were debated especially among Lessing, Herder, and Goethe. Each also experimented with ekphrasis. It is a feature of German Romanticism to question, as Herder did to begin with, not only seeing and discovering the one, single “poignant moment” in an artwork but moreover to use the experience in connecting with other sense perceptions. Herder commented in his contribution to the Laokoon debate that he found in it an eternal or timeless gaze (“einen ewigen Anblick”). He articulated a moment of timelessness, or immersion and forgetting, perhaps in wanting to keep a memory alive, to internalize and fully experience it, and hence to overcome the restrictions of superficial, linear temporality. Goethe was similarly an advocate of the “Lebenspunkt” or the truly lived experience that should transcend an artwork. Romanticism is marked by a shift of attention from lived to reflected sense perceptions and feelings. In addition to the visual sense, processes of multiple sense perceptions gain new recognition and, as Herder had already anticipated, a correlating and synthesizing formation of multisensory perceptions into feeling (“Gefühl”) or what he called “Gestalt.”31 German Romanticism experimented with reflections and memories. They consist of legends, songs, dreams, hallucinations, the unconscious, and ekphrasis, so that textual images are shown not only to transmit,

174  Beate I. Allert but also to interrupt communication. This is particularly true in the context of the literary reception of the Loreley poems and narratives from Brentano’s and Eichendorff’s versions. Their diverse texts illustrate that poetic images become like echoes of one another, easily changeable, hazy, or fluid. The understanding of what is seen is questionable and actions contract into rather mobile impressions that were not really deciphered but rather stylized retroactively. A loss of control in the perception process of recording lived experience and memory appears to be an issue to critics of Romanticism. Heine distances himself from the movement of Romanticism for the sake of a new realism (Junges Deutschland). Whereas Loreley may represent a personification of Nature, she may also personify music and illustrate ekphrastic failure in late Romanticism. She is not only a destructive and uncontrollable power; instead, the poems draw attention to problems of disorientation and a semiotic disengagement of words that can no longer adequately describe what is seen or experienced. As these poems indicate, the Loreley Rock is an authentic place where, due to the physical configuration of the environment, echoes happen and where one’s own voice bounces back repeatedly with effects of alienation. This mirrors the poets and their own inability to romanticize the world, as early Romantic philosophy had made them hope for. It is not surprising that some composers took up this insightful phenomenon and further developed these observations and ideas to give more weight to the temporal than to the spatial dimension. The Loreley story evolved into a persistent cultural memory based on literary and pictorial representations throughout the Romantic era. There exists a dangerous, narrow segment of the Rhine River at Bacharach, notorious for its fierce currents, that could have well explained any accidents. Yet any scientific explanation for what happened in those accidents was muted by culturally prescribed iconography. There have been many shipwrecks in the area.32 Fiction and reality have been immensely intertwined so that one cannot determine with certainty which was more important, the object of the gaze—the female Loreley—or the death of her apparent victims, the onlookers or fishermen. It was Heine’s contribution to illustrate the excess of memory by shifting agency from the narrator of the story or self-indulging spectators to the persons needed to engage in dialogue. Romantic poems and narratives make readers aware that cultural icons are powerful tools. Literature and art offer images that can be either dangerous stereotypes or valuable icons reminding us of real accidents. These are not simply to be repeated or mindlessly rehearsed. They can, as Heine asserts, lead to parody, or spark critical dialogue. His version of Loreley invites us to refresh our memories of dangerous situations and tragedies and to direct our own memories to hidden aspects in history. It activates fears and desires in the face of danger. Such ekphrastic matters deserve, as he points out, critical attention.

Images for Memories  175

Notes 1 This definition is my own, but it is well elaborated in Stephen Cheeke’s The Writing for Art: The Aesthetics of Ekphrasis. 2 See Andrew Sprague Becker’s The Shield of Achilles and the Poetics of Ekphrasis. 3 Jean Paul, Selina oder die Unsterblichkeit der Seele, Werke. Vol 6, ed. Norbert Miller (Munich: Carl Hanser, 1963), 1109–1236 (here 1182): The association of something “dark” within the human mind and its verbal picturing as a continent on the map, Africa, continues as an implicit, commonplace and must be noted for a potentially not only admiring and curious, but also racist attitude when linking the sensuality and chaos of “das Unbewußte” with the geographical location (“Afrika”) and the skin-color of the people who live there—extended and refocused especially in Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” (1899). One may also think in this context of Peter Firchow’s Envisioning Africa. 4 See also Joseph D. Rockelmann, Dreams, Hallucinations, Dragons, the Unconscious, and Ekphrasis in German Romanticism: Ludwig Tieck’s Skillful Study of the Mind. 5 Strictly speaking, Loreley is the German spelling for the rock headland in the middle Rhine, and Lorelei the spelling of the name of the female figure associated with the rock. However, these distinctions are seldom maintained, especially in English. For consistency and to avoid confusion, I will adopt the spelling Loreley for both the headland and the female figure, except in quotations from other sources. Etymologically, this name has been linked to the word lureln which in the Rhine dialect means “murmuring” and the Celtic term ley, “rock.” The “murmuring” is rather associated with the water than the rock and is the location where according to local legend fishermen had shipwrecks. Another account of local history uses the word “lauern” (to lurk) which is to be associated with the name of the Loreley Mountain, which borders the beautiful Rhine valley. It would associate the gaze with something that can have fatal consequences when it stares or strikes back. The rock has gained an agency or a power of its own, see further: Peter Lentwojt, Die Loreley in ihrer Landschaft: Romantische Dichtungsallegorie und Klischee: Ein Literarisches Sujet bei Brentano, Eichendorff, Heine und Anderen, Europäische Hochschulschriften: Reihe 1, Deutsche Sprache und Literatur 1664 (Bern: Peter Lang, 1998), 37–42. 6 I have elaborated on this in G.E. Lessing: Poetic Constellations between the Visual and the Verbal (Heidelberg: Synchron, 2018). 7 On the intricate Laokoon debate from antiquity to the nineteenth century and on its lasting relevance for ekphrasis studies and art theory today, see Beate Allert, “Ekphrasis und die Kunst des Verstehens: Möglichkeiten und Grenzen im Kontext Lessing” in Lessing und die Sinne, ed. Alexander Košenina and Stefanie Stockhorst (Hannover: Wehrhahn Verlag, 2016), 161– 81, G.E. Lessing: Poetic Constellations between the Visual and the Verbal (Heidelberg: Synchron 2018), especially chapter 4 “Lessing’s Laokoon and Paralipomena,ˮ 107–38. Also Allert, “Vom Augenblick zum Anblick: Herder und die Laokoondebatte. Herders Rhetoriken im Kontext des 18. Jahrhunderts, ed. Ralf Simon (Heidelberg: Synchron, 2014), 373–86. 8 “Alkahest” was considered the universal solvent of alchemists. 9 Stephen Cheeke’s Writing for Art: The Aesthetics of Ekphrasis refers to W.J.T. Mitchell’s Picture Theory outlining “three modes of the ekphrastic process: firstly ekphrastic ‘indifference’, that is the ‘commonsense perception that ekphrasis is impossible.’ How could any verbal description ever hope to

176  Beate I. Allert ‘reproduce’ a work of art? … Secondly, there exists precisely that ‘ekphrastic hope’, that is ‘when the impossibility of ekphrasis is overcome in imagination or metaphor” (Cheeke 28). He adds that this would be what Mitchell describes as “the hope of overcoming ‘otherness’: the hope that the word might stand for the image, and no one will notice the difference, or that the difference will disappear.” And he then makes a reference to the “third mode” which Mitchell calls “ekphrastic fear.” Stephen Cheeke comments that it “constitutes the moment of resistance or counter desire … when the difference between the visual and the verbal mediation becomes a moral, aesthetic imperative” (28–29). In the light of this ekphrasis debate, it seems to me that the development of the Loreley legend throughout Romanticism is a gradual coming to the senses, a realization that it is indispensable to consider images as something that has real implications not only for the mind of the observer or poet but that may require intervention in an ethical or political sense as Heine seems to indicate. 10 “Dornauszieher,” Reinhard Lullies and Max Hirmir, Griechische Plastik: Von den Anfängen bis zum Beginn der römischen Kaiserzeit, 4th ed. (Munich: Hirmir Verlag, 1979), plate 298 and 144–45. The statue is in the Capitoline Museum in Rome and there is a copy in the Louvre. 11 Heinrich von Kleist, “Über das Marionettentheater,” Sämtliche Werke und Briefe, ed. Ilse-Marie Barth et al., 4 vols. (Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1987–97), vol. 3, 555–63 at 560. 12 Friedrich Schiller, “Über naïve und sentimentalische Dichtung,” Werke und Briefe, ed. Otto Dann et al., 12 vols. (Frankfurt am Main: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1989–2004), vol. 8 (1992), ed. Rolf-Peter Janz et al., 706–810. 13 Clemens Brentano, Godwi oder Das steinerne Bild der Mutter, Werke, ed. Friedhelm Kemp et al., 4 vols. (Munich: Carl Hanser, 1963–1968), vol. 2, 7–445: “Zu Bacharach am Rheine / Wohnt eine Zauberin, / Sie war so schön und feine / Und riß viel Herzen hin. / Und brachte viel zu schanden / Der Männer rings umher. / Aus ihren Liebesbande / War keine Rettung mehr.ˮ The poem appears in the second part of the novel, vol. 2, 426–29. 14 In the volume of Brentano’s poetry two versions are given (Werke, vol. 1, 112–18), the first as the text is printed in Godwi and the second under the title, “Lureley” is a slightly different version found in Brentano’s manuscripts (Werke, vol. 1, 1051–52). See Klaus-Dieter Krabiel, “Die beiden Fassungen Brentanos ‘Lureley’,” Literaturwissenschaftliches Jahrbuch, NF 6 (1965): 122– 32. Both versions begin: “Zu Bacharach am Rheine / Wohnt eine Zauberin.” 15 Even though it did not appear in print until after Brentano’s death, the text must have circulated among his friends. For example, the opening was published in the Frankfurt periodical, Isis 260 (December 31, 1826), 1042–43. 16 He was introduced in the previous Märchen: “Das Märchen von dem Rhein und dem Müller Radlauf,” Werke, vol. 3, 9–105. 17 Allen Wilson Porterfield, “Graf von Loeben and the Legend of Lorelei,” Modern Philology 13.6 (October 1915): 65–92 [305–32], suggests that Brentano adapted these details from a folk tale, “Die Jungfrau auf dem Lurley,” 81–84 [301–04]. 18 The seven maidens are a personification of the “sieben Jungfrauen,” seven rocks in the Rhine at Oberwesel, a little to the north of Bacharach. See folktale number 15, “The Seven Sisters, Folktales from the Rhine Regionˮ (“Die Sieben Schwestern”) in “Volkssagen aus den Gegenden am Rhein,” (60–62). At other times Lurley is associated with Madam Earth (“Frau Erde”) (Werke, vol. 3, 177, 184) and Madam Air (“Frau Luft”) (Werke, vol. 3, 193, 195).

Images for Memories  177 19 Heinrich Heine, Buch der Lieder (Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1827), 178–79. See Heinrich Heine, Gedichte, ed. Christoph Siegrist, Werke in Vier Bänden, ed. Hans Mayer (Frankfurt am Main: Insel Verlag, 1994), 1: 49. Heine’s poem inspired numerous musical interpretations, the most notable versions being those by Philipp Friedrich Silcher (1789–1860) in 1837, Franz List (1811–1886) in 1841 (revised several times), and Clara Schumann (1819–1896) in 1843. For an extended discussion of the poem, see Lentwojt, Die Loreley, 203–19. 20 Heine appears to have based his narrative in part on “Die Jungfrau auf dem Lurley,” which begins: “In alten Zeiten ließ sich manchmal auf dem Lurley … eine Jungfrau sehen” (63; “In olden days was sometimes seen a young woman on the Loreleyˮ). Note line 3, “Ein Märchen aus alten Zeiten.” As in the folktale, the action of Heine’s poem takes place at dusk when the tops of the mountains sparkle “[i]m Abendsonnenschein” (line 8; “in the evening sunshine”). The opening of the folktales refers to a “Felsenriff” (“rocky reef”) as does Heine’s poem (line 19). Finally, both the folktale and Heine emphasize the young woman’s singing. See Porterfield, “Graf von Loeben,” 81–84 [301–04]. The detail of the young woman combing her hair is either a detail invented by Heine and picked up by Brentano in one of his later revisions of his “Rheinmärchen,” or Heine had access to Brentano’s text and took the detail from there. On the other hand, it might have been present in both of them, given the common slippage between sirens, mermaids, and other part female water creatures and the popular iconography of these creatures combing their hair, which goes back to the Middle Ages. See Debra Hassig, “Sex in the Bestiaries,” The Mark of the Beast: The Medieval Bestiary in Art, Life and Literature, ed. Debra Hassig (New York: Garland, 1999), 71–97, here 80–81. 21 Although this carelessness is something emphasized in “Die Jungfrau auf dem Lurley:” “weil sie nicht mehr auf den Lauf des Fahrzeugs achteten” (63; “because they no longer paid attention to the operation of their boat”). 22 Beate Allert, “Heine’s Doctor Faust: A Ballet Poem,” Faust Adaptations from Marlowe to Aboudoma and Markland, ed. Lorna Fitzsimmons (West Lafayette: Purdue UP, 2016), 66–77. 23 For commentary on this passage see: Thomas Pfau, Romantic Moods: Paranoia, Trauma, and Melancholy, 1790-1840 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2005), 379. 24 Ludwig Marcuse, Heinrich Heine: Ein Leben zwischen Gestern und Morgen, 2nd ed. (Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1951). 25 Heine seems to celebrate all the creatures imagined by poets, yet as a poet dissociates himself from any stylizing or sanctioning of any kind of gaze that would be ethically false, give blame to the innocent, and thus be misleading. He may, in other words, turn attention from the image of a writer who simply repeats what others have experienced, from mere looking as recorded in the Lorely versions, to intervention and social interaction. The poet becomes a creator. 26 Pfau, in Romantic Moods, diagnoses what he calls in the header of his seventh chapter: “Melancholy into Ressentiment: Aesthetic and Social Provocation in Heine’s Buch der Lieder.” See the Table of Contents, viii and 379–471. My reading of Heine here differs since Heine is not only about melancholy and resentment since he draws attention to what I have called an excess of memory. Instead of getting stunned or immobilized by images, he reminds his readers of the possibility of intervention and active engagement.

178  Beate I. Allert 27 Joseph von Eichendorff, Werke, ed. Wolfgang Frühwald et al., 6 vols. (Frankfurt am Main: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1987–1993), vol. 1, Gedichte (1987), ed. Hartwig Schulz, 328, 219–20, 299, 140–45, 323–24, 427 and 486. See also, Lentwojt, Die Loreley, 231–70. 28 Stanzas one and three are without quotation marks and belong to the male voice, while stanzas two and four which are given quotation marks in this account belong to the female voice. 29 “Dryden’s Ode auf den Cäcilienstag ist voller musikalischen Gemälde, die den Pinsel müßig lassen” (Lessing, Laokoon FA 5/2, 114; “Dryden’s Ode on Cäcilie is full of musical paintings that are not matched by any brush”). 30 See also Allert, “Ekphrasis und die Kunst des Verstehens,” 161–81 at p. 169, especially note 20 on page 169. 31 See my chapter “Herder’s Mental Imprinting: Cognition and ‘Gestalt’ Formation” in Allert, ed. J. G. Herder: From Cognition to Cultural Science/ Von der Erkenntnis zur Kulturwissenschaft (Heidelberg: Synchron Wissenschaftsverlag, 2016), 105–19. 32 On January 13, 2011, the 2500-ton vessel “Waldhof” capsized with the loss of two crew members resulting in the river being closed for a month. See: https://www.dw.com/en/tanker-carrying-acid-capsizes-in-germanys-rhineriver/a-14764590. Consulted 04. April 2020.

Works Cited Allert, Beate I. “Vom Augenblick zum Anblick: Herder und die Laokoondebatte.” Herders Rhetoriken im Kontext des 18. Jahrhunderts. Ed. Ralf Simon. Heidelberg: Synchron, 2014. 373–86. ———. “Ekphrasis und die Kunst des Verstehens: Möglichkeiten und Grenzen im Kontext Lessing.” Lessing und die Sinne. Ed. Alexander Košenina and Stefanie Stockhorst. Hannover: Wehrhahn Verlag, 2016a. 161–81. ———. “Herder’s Mental Imprinting: Cognition and Gestalt Formation.” Herder: From Cognition to Cultural Science/Herder: Von der Erkenntnis zur Kulturwissenschaft. Ed. Beate Allert. Heidelberg: Synchron, 2016b. 105–19. ———. Lessing: Poetic Constellations between the Visual and the Verbal. Heidelberg: Synchron, 2018. Allert, Beate and Christina Weiler, “Herder Orphaned as Kant’s Intellectual Child but Father of an Innovative Metaphorology before Blumenberg.” ( )rfandade: Revista Eletrônica do grupo de Pesquisa em Literatura, Tradução, Semiótica Apoio UFBA-CNPQ, 2 (2016): 34 pp. http://www.orfandade.ufba.br. Becker, Andrew Sprague. The Shield of Achilles and the Poetics of Ekphrasis. London: Rowman & Littlefield, 1995. Beckmann, Dieter and Barbara Beckmann. Alraun, Beifuß und andere Hexenkräuter: Alltagswissen vergangener Zeiten. Frankfurt a.M.: Campus Verlag, 1990. Beutler, Ernst. “Der König in Thule” und die Dichtungen von der Lorelay Ein Essay. Goethe-Schriften 1. Zürich: Artemis Verlag, 1947; Rpt. in Ernst Beutler, Essays um Goethe, 2nd ed. Frankfurt: Insel Verlag, 1995. 333–88. Brentano, Clemens. Werke. Ed. Friedhelm Kemp et al. 4 vols. Munich: Carl Hanser, 1963–1968. Burwick, Frederick. Mimesis and its Romantic Reflections. University Park: U of Pennsylvania P, 2001. Cheeke, Stephen. The Writing for Art: The Aesthetics of Ekphrasis. Manchester: Manchester UP, 2008.

Images for Memories  179 Eichendorff, Joseph von. Werke. Ed. Wolfgang Frühwald et al. 6 vols. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1987–1993. Elkins, James. The Object Stares Back: On the Nature of Seeing. San Diego: Harvest, 1997. ———. Visual Studies: A Skeptical Introduction. New York: Routledge, 2003. Fichte, Johann Gottlieb. Werke. Ed. Wilhelm G. Jacobs and Peter Lothar Oesterreich. 2 vols. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1997. 1: 219–375. Hassig, Debra. “Sex in the Bestiaries.” The Mark of the Beast: The Medieval Bestiary in Art, Life and Literature. Ed. Debra Hassig. New York: Garland, 1999. 71–97. Heine, Heinrich. Buch der Lieder. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1827. ———. Historisch-kritische Gesamtausgabe der Werke. Ed. Manfred Windfuhr and Frauke Bartelt. 16 vols. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1973–1992. ———. Die Romantische Schule. Werke. Vol. 4, Schriften über Deutschland. Ed. Helmut Schanze. Frankfurt a.M.: Insel Verlag, 1994. 166–298. ———. Werke in Vier Bänden. Ed. Hans Mayer. Frankfurt a.M.: Insel Verlag, 1994. Huch, Ricarda. Blütezeit der Romantik. 3rd ed. 2nd rev. Leipzig: Haessel, 1905. Paul, Jean. Selina oder die Unsterblichkeit der Seele. Werke. Sechster Band. Ed. Norbert Miller. Munich: Carl Hanser, 1963. 1109–236. Kleist, Heinrich von. Sämtliche Werke und Briefe. Ed. Ilse-Marie Barth et al. 4 vols. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1987–1997. Krabiel, Klaus-Dieter. “Die beiden Fassungen der Brentanos ‘Lureley’.” Literaturwissenschaftliches Jahrbuch, NF 6 (1965): 122–32. Krieger, Murray. Ekphrasis: The Illusion of the Natural Sign. Baltimore: John Hopkins UP, 1992. Lentwojt, Peter. Die Lorelei in ihrer Landschaft. Romantische Dichtungsallegorie und Klischee. Ein literarisches Sujet bei Brentano, Eichendorff, Heine und Anderen. Europäische Hochschulschriften: Reihe 1, Deutsche Sprache und Literatur 1664. Bern: Peter Lang, 1998. Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim. Laocoon: An Essay upon the Limits of Painting and Poetry. Trans. Ellen Frothingham. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1887. Werke und Briefe. Ed. Wilfried Barner et al. Vol. 5/2. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985–2003. ———. “Laokoon oder Über die Grenzen zwischen Malerei und Poesie,” Werke und Briefe, ed. Wilfried Barner et al., 12 vols. in 14 (Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985–2003), vol. 5/2, ed. Wilfried Barner (1990): 11–321 [FA 5/2]. Lullies, Reinhard and Max Hirmir. Griechische Plastik: Von den Anfängen bis zum Beginn der römischen Kaiserzeit. 4th ed. Munich: Hirmir Verlag, 1979. Marcuse, Ludwig. Heinrich Heine: Ein Leben zwischen Gestern und Morgen. 2nd ed. Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1951. Müller, Götz. “Die Einbildungskraft im Wechsel der Diskurse Annotationen zu Adam Bernd, Karl Philipp Moritz und Jean Paul.” Der ganze Mensch: Anthropologie und Literatur im 18. Jahrhundert. DFG-Symposion 1992. Ed. Hans-Jürgen Schings. Stuttgart: Metzler, 1994. 697–723; rpt. in Götz Müller. Jean Paul im Kontext: Gesammelte Aufsätze. Ed. Wolfgang Riedel. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 1996. 140–64.

180  Beate I. Allert Novalis. The Novices of Sais: Sixty Drawings by Paul Klee. Trans. Ralph Mannheim. New York: Curt Valentin, 1949. ———. Werke. Tagebücher und Briefe. Band 1. Ed. Richard Samuel. Munich: Carl Hanser Verlag, 1978. Pater, Walter. The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1986. Pfau, Thomas Romantic Moods: Paranoia, Trauma, and Melancholy, 1790-1840. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2005. Porterfield, Allen Wilson. “Graf von Loeben and the Legend of Lorelei.” Modern Philology 13.6 (October 1915): 65–92 [305–32]. Richter, Jean Paul Friedrich (“Jean Paul”). Selina oder die Unsterblichkeit der Seele. Werke. Vol. 6. Ed. Norbert Miller. Munich: Carl Hanser, 1963. 1109–236. Rockelmann, Joseph D. Dreams, Hallucinations, Dragons, the Unconscious, and Ekphrasis in German Romanticism. Ludwig Tieck’s Skillful Study of the Mind. Studies on Themes and Motifs in Literature 137. New York: Peter Lang, 2018. Schiller, Friedrich. Werke und Briefe. Ed. Otto Dann et al. 12 vols. Frankfurt am Main: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1989–2004. Schreiber, Alois Wilhelm. Handbuch für Reisende am Rhein: von Schafhausen bis Holland, in die schönsten anliegenden Gegenden und an die dortigen Heilquellen. 2nd ed. Heidelberg: Joseph Engelmann, 1818. ———. Sagen aus den Rheingegenden, dem Schwarzwalde und den Vogesen. 3rd ed. Frankfurt a.M.: Joseph Engelmann (Joseph Baer), 1848. Tieck, Ludwig. Schriften. Vol. 6. Phantasus. Ed. Manfred Frank. Frankfurt a.M.: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985.

Part III

Reception

8 The Failure of Social Memory to Validate the Icelandic Translation of “Der blonde Eckbert” (1835) Shaun F.D. Hughes

8.1 Tieck’s “Der blonde Eckbert” and Social Memory Already in the early nineteenth century, Ludwig Tieck’s “Der blonde Eckbert” was recognized as one of the outstanding literary productions of the German Romantic movement. As Manfred Frank puts it in his commentary on the text of the story: “Der blonde Eckbert [!] gilt mit Recht für Tiecks erzählerisches Meisterwerk” (DKV, 6:1255; “‘Eckbert the Fair’ is regarded correctly as Tieck’s narrative masterpiece” [My translations, from Icelandic or German into English throughout]).1 The story had initially appeared in 1797 in the first volume of the Volksmährchen, which Tieck published under the pseudonym Peter Leberecht,2 and then again, slightly revised, in 1812 as the lead story in the first volume of Phantasus.3 However, when this story appeared translated into Icelandic in the first issue of the radical new journal, Fjölnir,4 published in Copenhagen, reports were that most people back home found the story stupid and a waste of time.5 Iceland was a dependency of Denmark and, like Ireland at the time, suffering the political, economic, as well as social disadvantages that this entailed. There were no urban areas, people struggled to survive in a rural, subsistence economy where agricultural practices had not changed for hundreds of years, and where the practice of social memory was one of the sustaining features of everyday life. In his study of social memory, Paul Connerton argues that such memory requires a point of beginning which has “nothing whatsoever to hold on to; it is as if it came out of nowhere” (6). For modern social memory, Connerton associates this beginning with the French Revolution (6–13). While this may be true for the rest of Europe, it does not seem to hold true for Iceland where the majority of Icelanders were completely untouched by this event and its consequences. The “Middle Ages” were still a palpable presence for the majority of people living in Iceland in the early nineteenth century in terms of living conditions and also in literary taste. The young reformers, who are the focus of this article, wanted to distance themselves as far as possible from this “medieval” mind-set except in certain narrowly focused DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-12

184  Shaun F.D. Hughes ways. In some ways, then, for them medieval Iceland was something best forgotten rather than remembered.6 The importance of the French Revolution was clear to some Icelanders, such as the indefatigable Enlightenment reformer, Magnús Stephensen (1762–1833),7 who tried to educate his country people in a long article surveying the latest developments concerning this event which appeared in the first volume of his periodical Minnisverð Tíðindi in 1796, but this seems to have had little impact.8 Social memory at the time was also premodern, corresponding, I suggest, to Connerton’s “unreflective traditional memory” (16). In addition, literacy was relatively widespread throughout all levels of Icelandic society in the eighteenth century, especially after the 1740s when the Crown instituted a series of reforms with a strong pietistic flavor.9 These reforms were largely successful, even though most children were taught at home, the only schools in the country being the two cathedral schools which trained the children of the elite in preparation to sending them to Denmark for a university education. While the Church controlled the only printing press in the country until almost the end of the eighteenth century and with few exceptions published only religious works, this did not prevent the widespread copying and distribution of non-religious texts, because parallel to the official print culture, there was a flourishing manuscript culture, one which was rich in secular materials.10 In Connerton’s terms, this means that Icelandic premodern social memory was sustained by the “inscribing” practices of the manuscript culture” (73). The evidence suggests that the literary tastes of the majority of the people in 1800 were not all that different from those that would have been current in 1500 before the Reformation. Poetry was extremely popular, especially rímur, stanzaic metrical narratives which had first appeared in the fourteenth century and which came to dominate Icelandic literary production in verse for more than 400 years.11 As far as prose was concerned, one genre stood out head and shoulders above all the others, and that was anything claiming to be “history” or saga, even though by the end of the eighteenth century, “history” had come to mean one thing for the educated elite and something quite different for the majority of the people.12 It has already been noted that social memory in Icelandic society around 1800 did not depend upon the French Revolution, but if the most popular types of saga are considered, then it becomes clear that the “point of beginning” for social memory at the time was the settlement of Iceland, traditionally considered to have begun in the year 870. This early period is the focus of the classical Family sagas (Íslendingasögur), believed by most to be historically accurate until well into the twentieth century. Iceland was settled from Scandinavia, so those histories of events in ancient Scandinavia before the settlement of Iceland were also considered important (fornaldarsögur Norðurlanda), with their monsters, magic, and folklore motifs. The adventures in the fornaldarsögur came to be seen to be on a par with the adventures in the Icelandic offshoot of European romance, and so the

The Failure of Social Memory  185 histories of knights (riddarasögur) also became part of this foundational concept of history, although by the end of the eighteenth century, the fornaldarsögur and the riddarasögur were for the most part no longer considered historically reliable by the educated Icelandic elite.13 However, for most people, those texts with saga in their title laid claim to being “history.” This is a premodern, pre-Enlightenment understanding of history which had altered little from what was current in the Middle Ages, being completely essentialized and unreflective without any of the sense of ambiguity implicit in the modern understanding of “history” or “historical reconstruction” (Bandlien, 1:303).14 The events in these stories were considered to have actually happened and furthermore these accounts were seen as valuable and useful repositories of ethical and moral truths, “secular scripture” as Northrop Frye once called similar stories.15 Despite hundreds of years of official disapproval of the fornaldarsögur and the riddarasögur, saga in general flourished. People defended those texts labeled saga with great tenacity, not because they were connoisseurs of history, but because these texts had become part of their “Identitätskonkretheit,” an aspect of being arising when “eine Gruppe ein Bewußtsein ihrer Einheit und Eigenart auf dieses Wissen stützt und aus diesem Wissen die formativen und normativen Kräfte bezieht, um ihre Identität zu reproduzieren” (Assmann 10–11; “a group bases a consciousness of their unity and uniqueness upon this knowledge and out of this knowledge they draw their formative and normative powers, to reproduce their identity”).16 This was something Magnús Stephensen encountered all the time, as he remarks in the preface to a book intended for children. He has had to struggle against those who “often condemn that which more enlightened friends of humanity come up with in order to remedy this which is deficient in many aspects, as a frightening innovation, as if everything old is good, everything new useless, our understanding of things and our customs incapable of improvement.”17 But not all secular narratives in prose or in verse were saga. For some of them the classification ævintýri (Old Icelandic ævintýr) was reserved, a term which first appears in medieval Icelandic religious literature as a particular translation of the Latin fabula, but with the meaning “stories that are at odds with the Truth of Scripture,” although equally it could also mean an “exemplum,” a short moral anecdote designed to help fill out a sermon.18 By the eighteenth century, it had come to mean stories which we now consider international folktales (Märchen), wonder-tales or “tales of magic” which Annti Aarne and Stith Thompson numbered 300–749 in their catalogue Types of the Folktale, and which subsequently came to be well represented in the collections of Icelandic folklore.19 While these narratives were popular among the general populace, they were in general not highly regarded by the religious and literary elite, often being disparagingly referred to as “lying-histories, ‘rubbish,’ and old wives’ tales” (lygasögur, ‘bábiljur,’ og kerlingabækur).20 For the Pietist reformers these stories in particular are singled out in the opening

186  Shaun F.D. Hughes sentence of the eighteenth section of the “Ordinance on Pastoral Visitation in Iceland,” dated May 27, 1746: “The parson must most earnestly admonish the household to be on their guard against useless histories and improbable and fabricated ævintýri which have been tolerated in the country, and under no circumstances condone that they be read or chanted21 in their house, so that children and those growing up are not led astray as a result.”22

8.2  Fjölnir Every now and again a literary periodical appears which launches a new literary movement and sometimes comes to be seen as representative of an entire generation’s literary output.23 Such a periodical in Icelandic literary history is the journal Fjölnir, which was published by Icelandic students in Copenhagen. It lasted for only nine issues, from 1835–1847, but its influence continued to reverberate for decades afterwards.24 Icelandic intellectuals in the early nineteenth century, especially the young men studying in Copenhagen, were affected by the currents of European Romanticism, and in particular were drawn to the principles of “nationalism; idealism; and aesthetic relativism” (Óskarsson 251). However, these currents were channeled into a form of Romantic Nationalism which shunned any influence from Icelandic folk literature which was regarded as something backward and contemptible. The four founding editors, or Fjölnismenn as they came to be called—Brynjólfur Pétursson (1810–1851), Jónas Hallgrímsson (1807–1845), Konráð Gíslason (1808–1891), and Tómas Sæmundsson (1807–1841)—were all major intellectual figures in a movement to modernize Icelandic literature and society and to make it more “European.”25 Even though Jónas Hallgrímsson was only 38 when he died, the work he left behind was sufficient to ensure that he is regarded as one of the most important poets of the nineteenth century. The editors’ manifesto which opens the first issue of Fjölnir was written by Tómas Sæmundsson, who was perhaps the most culturally conservative of the four editors,26 and who by the time the first issue appeared was no longer in Copenhagen, having by then taken up the parsonage at Breiðabólsstaður on Fljótshlíð in Rangárvallasýsla in southern Iceland. Few would have found anything to quarrel with when he stated the “main points” that the editors intended to have continually before their eyes as their guide,27 which were that the contents should be characterized by their “usefulness” (“nytsemin”), “beauty” (“fegurðin”), “truthfulness” (“sannleikurinn”),28 and, chief of all, that the content should be “good and decorous” (“gott og siðsamlegt”).29 The contents of the first issue certainly fulfill these criteria. There are articles on the Icelandic poor law districts, on the nature and origin of the earth, and on the first printing press in Tahiti.30

The Failure of Social Memory  187 In his discussion of “beauty” in his foreword, Tómas Sæmundsson deplores the fact that ordinary Icelanders seem to lack any feeling for it. This is clearly a reference to the perceived lack of appreciation for “beauty” in the Icelandic character found in a long article by Ludvig Christian Müller (1806–1851) published over two issues of the first volume of the periodical, Den Nordiske Kirke-Tidende, founded by the Lutheran polemicist and reformer Jacob Christian Lindberg (1797– 1857).31 Müller was a pastor who had studied Icelandic and made an extended trip to the island in 1832. His reformist view of a conservative and backward Iceland appears to have appealed to the editors of Fjölnir, earning his work a place in the first issue. Of particular interest are Müller’s brief comments on the lack of aesthetic sensibility among the Icelanders: That which is most rare in Iceland is a sense of beauty and a poetic soul. Their verses are metrically complicated, and composed with great skill, but completely without soul. All singing, if that is what it may be called, befits them ill, and even the young people can scarcely bring themselves to sing the merriest comic lyric, except with a funeral air. (Müller 37)32 At the mention of “poetic soul,” the editors of Fjölnir insert a footnote making it clear that from the very outset they were opposed to the kind of poetry that was most popular and most beloved in the countryside: It may be that more is true in this than that. But when the author says that the verses of the Icelanders are completely without soul, then he has likely had in mind some of the poetry in Skírnir [a rival periodical, first published in 1827 and still appearing annually] or then some rímur or another. (“Athugasemdir” 37) However, the editors of Fjölnir make it clear from the very first issue, that not only is the content of the rímur reprehensible, but so is also their form.33

8.3 “Eggert Glói” Right from the first issue, Fjölnir was a controversial publication, especially back in Iceland where sentiments were much more conservative than among the young university students in the Danish capital. But no one item was more divisive in this first issue than the final item which ignited a major controversy because it was felt that it was at odds with the editors’ claim that they were dedicated to presenting works that were

188  Shaun F.D. Hughes useful, beautiful, and true.34 Jónas Hallgrímsson and Konráð Gíslason, who were much more radical in their belief of the need to reform literary taste than Tómas Sæmundsson, were also interested in introducing their Icelandic audience to the latest in European prose fashions.35 To this end, they had included a translation of Tieck’s “Der blonde Eckbert” to close out the first issue. Their choice of this story can hardly be faulted from a literary point of view, but while the decision to bring this story before the Icelandic public may have been aesthetically motivated, in the face of an almost overwhelmingly negative reception by its intended audience, when Jónas and Konráð tried to defend their choice, they did not rely on arguments involving beauty, taste, and “poetic soul” (they just asserted these were present in the story) but rather on those grounded in what we would now call collective memory. Tieck had first published “Der blonde Eckbert” in a volume entitled Folk Fairy Tales (Volksmärchen), although these were narratives of his own making or retellings of stories from chapbooks (“Fortunatus”) and other published sources, not collected from popular tradition as were those assembled by the Brothers Grimm. He later refers to these stories as “folk tales” (Märchen) and “stories” (Erzählungen) in his foreword to Phantasus (1812).36 The word Märchen itself occurs twice in the story, and on both occasions the word is used by characters in the narrative to contrast the imaginary world of the fairy tale with the reality of their lived experience as they describe it. First it appears early on when Bertha says: “Nur haltet meine Erzählung für kein Märchen, so sonderbar sie auch klingen mag” (Tieck, 6:127; “[S]aga mín sè neín skröksaga, hvað undarlega sem hún hljóðar” [Fjölnir 1 (1835): 147]) and then once more towards the end when Eckbert reflects: “[D]aß ihm sein Leben in manchen Augenblicken mehr wie ein seltsames Märchen, als wie ein wirklicher Lebenslauf erschien” (Tieck, 6:143; “[A]ð honum sýndist æfi sín og tíðum fremur vera undarleg skröksaga, enn verulegt æfiskeið,” [Fjölnir 1 (1835): II.166]). On both of these occasions, Jónas and Konráð translate “Märchen” as “skröksaga” (a fable or fabricated history), one of the synonyms for “ævintýri.” And when they give Tieck’s narrative the title “Ævintír af Eggèrti Glóa,”37 this is on one level perfectly adequate in that it makes a formal distinction between Tieck’s “Märchen,” for which the archaic term “ævintýr” in the meaning “exemplum” is revived to distinguish this story from a (vulgar) folk “Märchen” (skröksögur or ævintýri).38 What the translators did not take into account was that this distinction went over the heads of most of the contemporary Icelandic audience who failed to notice the distinction between “ævintýr” and “ævintýri” and interpreted the work only within the negative connotations of the latter.39 Tómas Sæmundsson, however, recognized immediately what was at stake here. In a letter to Jónas Hallgrímsson dated September 6, 1835 reporting on his receipt of the first issue of Fjölnir, when Tómas gets to

The Failure of Social Memory  189 “Eggert Glói,” it is clear that he reads “ævintýr” as “ævintýri—or as he puts it “old wives’ tale” (“kellinga frásögur”)—and therefore silently changes the title (and the genre) to “saga” (history): The “History of Eggert Glói” seems to me unusually beautiful. Despite this many say that it’s just the same as one of our Old Wives’ Tales; others that it is ugly (because it has an unhappy ending!). The intention is that most should understand it better. I would wish that we obtain sufficiently more of such pages when other [matter] falls short. (Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar 161) When Konráð comes to defend the story in the fourth issue of Fjölnir, it is clear that he has taken Tómas’ suggestion to heart, in that he treats the story as saga—but at the same time he reinterprets the meaning of the word.

8.4 The First Reviews and Fjölnir’s Response In 1835, the year Fjölnir was established, a new periodical appeared in Reykjavík. This was the monthly Sunnanpósturinn edited by Árni Helgason (1777–1869). During the three years that Sunnanpósturinn was published (1835–1836, 1838), the rivalry between it and Fjölnir was palpable, with the editors making frequent references to the contents of each other’s publication. In the January issue of its second volume (1836), Sunnanpósturinn began the publication of a long letter from District Commissioner (sýslumaður) Eiríkur Sverrisson (1790–1843) written under the pseudonym “a person from Borgafjörður” (“ein Borgfirðingur”), dated November 20, 1835. This letter ran through nine monthly issues and provided a thorough discussion of the contents of the first issue of Fjölnir.40 “Ein Borgfirðingur” finally gets around to “Eggért glói” in the conclusion of his letter which appeared in the December 1836 issue of Sunnanpósturinn. Finally, we arrive at the heart of the matter with regard to beauty, and that is “Eggért glói.”—I wish to address how ordinary people respond to this fairy tale (æfintýri), because Fjölnir readers will want to know, and so it is important to state clearly that everyone that I have heard mention it considers it to be superstitious rubbish and a spiritually impoverished old wives’ tale (kellingabók).—This I cannot agree with entirely, because the fairy story does contain some matters for consideration regarding morality along with some eloquent passages; but I do not find that it has anything in it that would make it worthy of a place among the masterpieces.—The main characters in the story live in shabby indolence and isolation and drift

190  Shaun F.D. Hughes along without any clear plans, most like wood in a current; and indeed it is a petulant judgment on us that the Fjölnir editors pronounce, that if “Eggért glói” does not appeal to us, then we must ourselves “compose some kind of fairy tale that is not any the worse.”41—Because, is that not unfair to suppose that we should succeed better in composing something new, than the highly educated editors of Fjölnir, who chose this specific tale as suitable for translation, when they have access to all the literary masterpieces of Europe? (Sunnanpósturinn 2.12: 188–89)42 The publication of the story was a serious blunder, as it was not understood by its intended audience who failed to see any distinction between ævintýr and ævintýri and who had no understanding of “aesthetic relativism.” Prose narratives, especially those given the distinction of appearing in print, were expected to be “useful,” however one might wish to define that word. Old wives’ tales (ævintýri) might all very well have their place in society, but they were not to be dignified by appearing in print and wasting the time of the reading public. The second volume of Fjölnir contained its own response to the correspondent in Sunnanpósturinn in the form of extracts from a letter reviewing the contents of the first issue, but from the opposite side of the country, and published at the instigation of Tómas Sæmundsson.43 The author of the letter has been identified as Ólafur Indriðarson (1796– 1861), parson at Kolfreyjustaður in Fáskrúðsfjörður in the East Fjords. Ólafur Indriðarson is well aware that the translation of “Der blonde Eckbert” was widely scorned and he tries to soften the blow. The Fairy Tale (æfintýri) of Eggert glói, or others like it, I consider in retrospect of little use for most Icelanders; they pay scarcely any heed to, or derive any benefit from such things.44 At least I have heard many reproach and have repulsion for such fables (skröksögur) in which they see no point.45 I think elegant poems, believable stories and such would be more in tune with the common taste and be of more use. (Fjölnir 2: I.40)46 While the reverend Ólafur, who was a noted author of hymns, seems to praise the perspicacity of the ordinary reader in rejecting the story of Eggert glói (which I suspect means that he could see no point to the story either), that praise is short-lived, as he subsequently takes these readers to task for their lack of taste in preferring the poetry of the most popular rímur poet of the day, Sigurður Breiðfjörð (1798–1846), to the verse of the Icelandic translations of Klopstock’s Messias or Milton’s Paradise Lost, both the work of Jón Þorláksson (1744–1819).47

The Failure of Social Memory  191 The editors of Fjölnir begin their defense of the “Eggert glói” towards the end of Ólafur’s critique of the story by inserting a footnote (signed “F”) at the point where it is reported that most readers see no point in the story. It is peculiar that so many Icelanders should have such little regard for the history (saga) of Eggért glói. For the time being we will not explore further how brilliantly the tale is composed, and what beauty is concealed within it; but one might well solicit some Icelander to compose a fairy story (ævintýri) that would not be any the worse; because then it would be sufficient to translate it into a second language so that all the peoples of Europe would say to themselves: “it is safe to consider this Icelander among the best writers of this century.” (Fjölnir 2: I.40) Following Tómas Sæmundsson’s lead, the footnote, through the same rhetorical sleight of hand, takes the narrative out of the disreputable genres of ævintýri and skröksaga, and now considers it to be saga which has now been redefined as “historical fiction” as will become clear in Konráð’s full-fledged defense of the story in the fourth issue of Fjölnir (1838). But before that could happen, another score had to be settled.

8.5 Fjölnir on the Defensive The first issue of Fjölnir contained a negative review of a book that had appeared in Danish in 1834 addressing Iceland’s population and the country’s economic situation in the opening decades of the nineteenth century. The book’s author, Bjarni Thorsteinsson (1781–1876), the Lieutenant-Governor (amtmaður),48 lived at Arnastapa on Snæfellsness, and at that time the poet, Sigurður Breiðfjörð, was living in the vicinity at Grímsstaðir. Bjarni appears to have commissioned Sigurður to compose a lampoon (níðkvæði) about Fjölnir.49 This wicked review of the first issue of Fjölnir was a poem of 20 stanzas called “Fjölnis rjómi” (The Cream of Fjölnir), although only 15 of these stanzas were published in the second volume of Ljóða smámunir (“Tid-bits of Poetry”) which appeared in 1839. However, the whole poem was very popular and circulated in manuscript. Here is what Sigurður Breiðfjörð had to say about Fjölnir’s translation of “Der blonde Eckbert”: Ekkert bætir hann Eggert glói á honum lítið verður feitt, þó að hann kveði í kyrrum skógi kjaftæði um ekki neitt

192  Shaun F.D. Hughes Eftir þvílíkan þvættings lestur þjóðina bið um úrskurð þann hvort Fjölnir sé ei falskur prestur, sem fleka ætlar einfaldan. “Der blonde Eckbert” adds nothing there’s little nourishment in it even though he spouts in the still forest bullshit about nothing at all.50 After reading such balderdash the nation asks for a determination whether or not Fjölnir is a false clergyman, who intends to deceive the ordinary people.51 The phrase “í kyrrum skógi” (in the still forest) in the first stanza comes directly from the “Ævintír af Eggèrti Glóa” where it translates Tieck’s famous neologism Waldeinsamkeit. If this is not plainly a misunderstanding and mistranslation, it may have been an attempt by Jónas and Konráð to accommodate the narrative to the expectations of an Icelandic audience for whom forests are something only encountered in stories.52 Steingrímur Thorsteinsson (1831–1913), the Icelandic translator of the complete Thousand and One Nights (1858–1866) and other folklore materials, who published three of Tieck’s Kunstmärchen (ævintýri) including the “Ævintýri af Eggert Glóa” in 1905, does not make this mistake, although he does not alter the translation. He says: [A]nd it cannot be denied that some of [Tieck’s] fairy tales are extremely beautiful; both the conception is rich, the presentation admirable, and the effect charming in some places downright magical. As an example, one might mention the description of “the sense of being alone in the forest” [skógareinvera, i.e., Waldeinsamkeit] in the “Eggert Glói.” (Tieck, Þrjú æfintýri 109) But this is 70 years in the future. Back to 1836. The Fjölnismenn seem to have been taken by surprise by the negative response to Tieck’s story, and they were not at all amused by Sigurður’s poem, as there is what I take to be a reference to it on the concluding pages of the second issue in the opening sentences of the second of the two “Auglísíngar” (Advertisements): The readers of Fjölnir will not be unaware that it has immediately “aroused opposition to us and the hostility of some people,” and that some have composed lampoons about it. And it is hardly worth mentioning that none of us wish to degrade ourselves with quibbling with stupid people. (“Auglísíngar,” Fjölnir 2: III.58–59)53

The Failure of Social Memory  193 The editors of Fjölnir had already made clear in their footnote to Ludvig Christian Müller’s comments about the “soullessness” of Icelandic poetry quoted above, that in particular they took this to refer to the rímur, the traditional and much-beloved narrative poetry enjoyed by all classes of society. Furthermore between 1831 and 1836, no fewer than eleven volumes of rímur were published in Copenhagen or Viðey, five of them by Sigurður Breiðfjörð. In 1835, Árni Helgason, the editor of Sunnanpósturinn had brief, but laudatory comments on Sigurður’s Rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu (1831) and Rímur af Svoldar Bardaga (1833),54 while Sigurður’s rímur-style is again praised in the second issue of the newspaper in 1836.55 To add insult to injury, when Tómas Sæmundsson submitted his “Bréf frá Austfjörðum” early in 1836 for inclusion in the second issue of Fjölnir, it included a substantial section praising the rímur of Sigurður. This was omitted in the printed version.56 Not that this would probably have made any difference, for in a letter to Konráð Gíslason, dated August 21, 1837, Tómas takes Konráð to task for his obsession with spelling reform and the tone of his published defense of his position,57 all of which is costing the journal subscribers. Why could he not be like Jónas “who seems to me always to have contributed the most and the best, not least of all now; specifically, there are the two poems58 and “Concerning the rímur,”59 which seem to me to have succeeded admirably, and each word is so chosen in them, that it couldn’t be better phrased” (Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar 221). Jónas’ review of Sigurður Breiðfjörð’s Rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu, a poem which had been published six years earlier in 1831, is undoubtedly the most notorious review in Icelandic literary history.60 It is significant that Jónas singled out Sigurður’s first published poem which even those who loved the rímur found inadequate, rather than his later efforts such as the Rímur af Svoldar Bardaga and Rímur af Núma kóngi Pompílssyni, in which Sigurður struggles to address the perceived short-comings of the rímur genre.61 As early as 1878, Jón Borgfirðingur (1826–1912) suggested that the editors of Fjölnir and Jónas in particular took Sigurður’s lampoon personally,62 and there is some evidence that the antagonism between them was one of some standing.63 Sigurður wrote a vituperative response to the review, but it had limited circulation only being first published in 1962.64 Jónas’ review was a watershed in Icelandic literary history, not because it sounded the death-knell of the rímur as some have maintained, but because it established the claims of a university elite to determine the aesthetic values of Icelandic poetry, wresting that authority away from the traditional poets and their audience where it had resided for hundreds of years.

8.6 Konráð Gíslason Steps Up Readers had to wait until the fourth issue of Fjölnir (1838) for a fullyfledged defense of Tieck’s Kunstmärchen. Konráð would argue that the

194  Shaun F.D. Hughes story was actually a saga, a history, something highly valued, in order to placate those who did not like the story.65 To be sure, as far as he is concerned the basic problem is that the majority of Icelanders are so weighed down by “die große und immer größere Last des Vergangenen “(“the large and growing ever larger burden of the past”).”66 that they are void of good taste and incapable of appreciating the beauties of literature. Jónas Hallgrímsson, on the other hand, seems not to have been interested in history for history’s sake. For him, history was something to be evoked in order to help achieve goals in the present. Items from the past should be carefully selected to help advance the political struggle.67 The rest should be forgotten, no matter what the majority of Icelanders may have thought.68 Despite its long and convoluted nature, Konráð’s defense has a remarkedly modern feel about it. He conflates saga and ævintýri under the heading of what we would now call “fiction,” an argument that is far ahead of his time and would not be seriously entertained until well into the twentieth century. However, the concept “fiction” was not available to him in Icelandic, and in order to make his argument comprehensible (and palatable) to his contemporaries, he makes adjustments to the traditional vocabulary in order to be true to his principles and in the process anticipates what later scholars will call “social memory.” Ordinary Icelanders did not like “Eggert glói,” one of the best works of an author both famous and widely published in Germany, because the rímur and other such verse had made them insensible to true poetry (réttur skáldskapur).69 But by “poetry” it is clear that he means “literature.” The unfailing characteristic of good literature is not that it brings into focus “vigor and artfulness,”70 but rather that it responds to the audience’s requirement for poetic beauty, truth, and morality. All skáldskapur deals either with the invisible world or the visible one. If the latter, then it will either deal with nature or with the human world as it is revealed in the histories (sögurnar). To deal with the invisible world is also to deal with the human soul, its desires and dispositions. Yet these two kinds of poetry overlap and scarcely can one be without the other. To write about human realities (verur) a poet (skáld) has two options: the first is to follow the accounts (frásögn) which exist about the behavior of people at a certain given time, whether they are true or not and use them as the basis of histories and fairy stories (sögur og ævintýri). This allows people who read this kind of history (saga)71 to see the past (tíminn) in their minds, and the events will appear to them as if they were true, even though they are a pure fabrication. But neither is the story a lie, because it accurately reports that which it is describing. It is true to the extent literature (skáldskapur) is true, yet it is always involved in the creation of inventiveness and imagination. This is what is now meant by “social memory,” because it depends upon people’s accounts, but these accounts, these memories are reworked by the poet in order to create

The Failure of Social Memory  195 poetry, that is literature (skáldskapur) whether the resulting piece is called a saga or an ævintýri.72 However, its truth value is provisional. This would have been unacceptable for Konráð’s traditionally minded audience who would have never conflated saga with ævintýri, nor assigned truth value to the latter. This is not the case with “history (sagnfræði)73 which can only report that for which there are sources available. Since Konráð contrasts sagnfræði with saga, the implication appears to be that the former is not skáldskapur, that it is not saga or “inscribed social memory.”74 The rímur have made ordinary Icelanders insensible to the beauties of poetry and it appears that the traditional sagas have likewise made them incapable of appreciating the beauties of prose. Just as the rímur are mentioned only once, so is this kind of saga not discussed any further.75 The second option is for the poet to create the subject matter out of his own imagination and to rely on his knowledge of human nature. The more complete this knowledge, the better the work will be. The first kind of skáldskapur must also pay heed to this while the second kind is supported by paying attention to human conduct as daily experience presents it. Therefore, both kinds cannot exist separately. The second option was more in fashion when the sagas and folktales (sögur og ævintýri) were written down. Now Konráð seems to be using these terms in their traditional meaning and he continues that it was most common for poets not to base their subject matter on something which had actually happened, but rather to invent the subject matter themselves, creating people from their imagination, and displaying human souls and passions to the best of their ability. If the first option available to the poet has been characterized as “social” or “historical memory,” the second option is its antithesis, “historical imagination,” or in twenty-first century terms, “Medievalism” (German, Mittelalterrezeption), that is, responding to the Middle Ages in contemporary terms rather than actually studying them.76 Although Konráð does not specifically say so, it is implied that these stories are not “true” in the way “literature is true.” But they may have their uses. The rise of national feelings after the French Revolution led scholars to collect and preserve the treasures of the past found among the common people century after century.77 Here Konráð chooses to overlook the fact that Icelanders had not needed the French Revolution to make themselves aware of what it was to be an Icelander.78 Several hundred years of being a Danish dependency had made them appreciate their language and their indigenous literatures to an extent not found in the rest of Europe. Konráð says that most nations have enough of this kind of saga, which is either based on some event in the past or built up little by little in the public imagination. Being the result of the poet’s second option, “historical imagination,” he does not place much intrinsic value on this material. Its principal use appears to be to provide contemporary poets with the

196  Shaun F.D. Hughes subject matter for their poems and ævintýri. The well-known histories (sögur) after Sir Walter Scott are mostly based on popular old histories, that are half true or completely untrue which have been in the oral tradition and with which the common people have amused themselves.79 Among the English such histories have been wildly popular and have proven lucrative for their author. In Iceland the common people, especially the older ones, both men and women, know many of these kinds of histories (sögur), which are usually designated “lying-histories, ‘rubbish,’ and old wives’ tales.”80 However, there is more truth in them than people think and many of them turn out to be remarkable or humorously grounded and striking. They are sometimes based on actual events, sometimes completely invented, and often arise from very old sources. The same is true of many Icelandic ballads (fornkvæði). It would be a good idea if the parsons and other learned men collect this material and have it written down and brought to some independent repository such as the library in Reykjavík so that it is not completely lost.81 What this means is that Konráð does not want this material to be forgotten; he just wants it removed from circulation and stored in a safe place out of mind, because it is irrelevant in the present and has nothing to do with skáldskapur.82 Magnús Stephensen had spent 40 years trying to enlighten his countrymen with a steady outpouring of publications to little or no avail, because what he was trying to do was to radically revise his country people’s “Identitätskonkretheit.” Even though they saw themselves as Magnus’ heir, the Fjölnismenn also wanted to harness this particular Icelandic identity to their own nationalistic political agenda as part of their campaign to free Iceland from Danish rule. At one time, he continues, the poems in the Elder Edda were in circulation which made Iceland the envy of all nations. There seems to be less poetry of this kind in circulation now, but in the future scholars will certainly find much of interest in such texts, because this material reveals how people thought, whether that be good or not. The Grimm brothers and others have collected the stories of the common people and poets have used them as inspiration. Ludwig Tieck, who lives in Dresden in Saxony, is chief among them, and is regarded among Germans as Scott is among the English.83 An example of his work is the “Ævintýri af Eggerti Glóa”84 and it was translated into Icelandic to show Icelanders what the work of this highly regarded writer was like, and to demonstrate the potential that this kind of writing has, given that there is plenty of such material in the country upon which a poet could draw.85 Again, it is not the material that is important or valuable, it is the material as a source for new, inspired works of “poetry” as understood by the Fjölnismenn. The argument now circles back to the description of how skáldskapur deals with stories involving the human world, “social memory”; Tieck is like Sir Walter Scott in recovering a sense of the past. All the descriptions in “Eggert glói” and the customs of the people are just as they were in the

The Failure of Social Memory  197 Middle Ages. Each nobleman had to defend himself against other noblemen because things were so untrustworthy and unruly just as they were in Iceland in the Sturlungaöld.86 The nobles lived in their castles surrounded by a high wall situated on the highest point about as in “Eggert glói,” although it is most unlikely that either Eggert or Bertha ever existed.87 And what is particularly successful in the story is the description of nature. Konráð has now demonstrated how the story fulfills all the criteria laid out in the manifesto in the first issue of Fjölnir. As “history” (“saga”, i.e., “fiction”), the story is “nytsemi” (“useful”) and “sannlegur” (“truthful”). That it has “fegurð” (“beauty”) apparently goes without saying as that is something that even its opponents were prepared to admit. And he concludes by discussing what he sees as the most successful aspect of the story, how it is “good and decorous” (“gott og siðsamlegt”). The author has shown what the wages of sin for those who leave the path of truth even after a significant passage of time are.88 He demonstrates how one sin leads to another and conscience changes its tune (“mál”) like the bird, and that by this disposition (“skap”) innocence (“sakleísið”) is preserved or it is lost, and casts those into horror and misfortune who have been insincere about their repentance. Eventually punishment comes down without mercy. Scarcely any sermon exists which places this common truth before sensible and perceptive eyes as does this fairy tale. So far as I can tell, this defense of “Eggert glói” had no influence whatsoever. It did not convince anyone that saga and ævintýri were the same thing. The former continued to be held in high regard and the latter disparaged. It would not be until well into the twentieth century that this essay might have been read with sympathy and understanding, although by then its emphasis on “beauty” and “utility” would have seemed a little old fashioned. Nor did intellectuals follow up on the categories “social (historical) memory” and “historical imagination” as Konráð outlined them here. A saga was either true or it was not.89 Konráð’s appeal to the “truth” of social memory, and therefore the “truth of “Eggert glói,” failed to validate the story in the eyes of his countrymen. It was still “kjaftæði um ekki neitt” (“bullshit about nothing at all”). By collapsing saga and ævintýri, Konráð devalued saga, and for most Icelanders, to devalue saga meant to devalue themselves. Jónas Hallgrímsson seems to have understood this in his use of saga heroes like Gunnar Hámundarson in his poetry, and later reformers like Jón Sigurðsson co-opted saga rather than confronting it. Change would come, but it would come very slowly. The rímur, riddarasögur, and fornaldarsögur would continue to be important until economic changes in the countryside and the rise of urban life in Reykjavík and elsewhere fundamentally altered how literature was produced and consumed. “Eggert Glói” would be published again in 1905 as mentioned above, without anybody getting upset about anything, or even being too terribly interested.

198  Shaun F.D. Hughes

Notes 1 Ludwig Tieck, Phantasus, ed. Manfred Frank, Schriften in zwölf Bänden (Frankfurt: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985), 6 (1985): 1255 (hereafter cited as DKV 6). 2 Peter Leberecht, Volksmährchen, 3 vols. (Berlin: Karl August Nicolai, 1797), 1: 191–242. 3 Ludwig Tieck, Phantasus, 3 vols. (Berlin: Realschulbuchhandlung, 1812), 1: 165–93. For a modern edition, see Ludwig Tieck, “Der blonde Eckbert,” Phantasus, ed. Frank, 6: 126–48. See also, Detlef Kremer, “Frühes Erzählen (Auftragsarbeiten, Kunstmärchen),” Ludwig Tieck: Leben—Werk—Wirkung, ed. Claudia Stockinger and Stefan Scherer (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2011), 498– 514, esp. 504–08. 4 Fjölnir is one of the many names of Óðin. 5 Jón Karl Helgason uses Polysystem Theory to explore the disconnect between the translators’ expectations for the story and the general rejection of it by the general public. See his “Der Blonde Eckbert in an Alien Polysystem: The Reception of Tieck’s ‘skröksaga’ in 19th-Century Iceland,” Textual Production and Status Contests in Rising and Unstable Societies, ed. Massimiliano Bampi and Marina Buzzoni (Venice: Edizioni Ca’ Foscari, 2013), 115–26. 6 See Shaun F.D. Hughes, “Assembling Memory: The Questionnaire of 1817 from Den kongelige Commission til Oldsagers Opbevaring and the Origins of Icelandic Romantic Nationalism,” Myth, Magic, and Memory in Early Scandinavia Narrative Culture, ed. Jürg Glauser and Pernille Hermann (Turnhout, Brepols, 2021), 306–07. See further the section “Icelandic” in Encyclopedia of Romantic Nationalism in Europe, ed. Joep Leerssen, 2 vols. (Amsterdam: Amsterdam UP, 2018), 2: 1078–97, and Gylfi Gunnlaugsson, “Norse Myths, Nordic Identities: The Divergent Case of Icelandic Romanticism,” Nordic Myths, Modern Identities, ed. Simon Halink (Leiden: Brill, 2019), 73–86. 7 In 1794 he had been one of the founders of The Icelandic Society for National Enlightenment (Hið íslenska landsuppfræðingarfélag) which took control of the new printing press which had been on Hrappsey (1773–1795) and began to issue a steady stream of publications aimed at improving Icelandic cultural life. These were not always received with the enthusiasm Magnús thought they deserved, but he never wavered in his efforts. 8 “Ágrip um þær nyjustu Frønsku Stiornar-biltíngar,” Minnisverð Tíðindi 1 (1796–1798): 1–120. 9 See the chapter, “Educational Goals and Compulsory Education” in Loftur Guttormsson, Childhood, Youth and Upbringing in the Age of Absolutism, trans. Keneva Kunz (Reykjavík: Iceland UP, 2017), 73–125. 10 See Matthew J. Driscoll, “The Long and Winding Road: Manuscript Culture in Late Pre-Modern Iceland,” White Field, Black Seeds: Nordic Literacy Practices in the Long Nineteenth Century, ed. Anna Kuismin and Matthew J. Driscoll (Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society, 2013), 50–63; Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon and Davíð Ólafsson, Minor Knowledge and Microhistory: Manuscript Culture in the Nineteenth Century (London: Routledge, 2017). 11 For an extensive survey of attitudes towards the rímur in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, see Þórður Helgason, “Rímnamál,” Són 9 (2011): 75–113. 12 On the contested meaning of “history” in early Modern Iceland, see Shaun F.D. Hughes, “‘A Never-Ending Story’: History, Saga, and Secondary

The Failure of Social Memory  199 Creation,” From Rus’ to Rímur: Norse History, Culture, and Literature East and West, ed. Shaun F.D. Hughes and Allyn K. Peason (Ithaca: Cornell U Library, 2023), 85–125 at 96–100. The traditional proponents of saga have come to be called “barefoot historians” (Berfættir sagnfræðinga). See Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon and Davíð Ólafsson, “‘Barefoot Historians’: Education in Iceland in the Modern Period,” Writing Peasants: Studies on Peasant Literacy in Early Modern Northern Europe, ed. Klaus-Joachim Lorenzen-Schmidt and Bjørn Poulsen (Keterminde: Landbohistorisk Selskab, 2002), 175–202. The term was popularized in a different context by Volker Ullrich, “Spuren im Alltag. ‘Barfußhistoriker’—woher sie kommen und was sie wollen,” Die Zeit 45 (November 2, 1984): 73. 13 See Ralph O’Connor, “History or Fiction? Truth-Claims and Defensive Narrators in Icelandic Romance-Sagas,” Medieval Scandinavia 15 (2005): 101–69, for a convincing argument that the audience of the romance-sagas regarded them as history in the early modern period. But even for the elite toward the end of the eighteenth century, there was a certain amount of anxiety about where to draw the boundary as is evident from the foreword to a manuscript anthology of sagas of various kinds completed in 1789 by Halldór Jakobsson (1734–1810). See Shaun F.D. Hughes, “Halldór Jakobsson on Truth and Fiction in the Sagas (1789),” Gripla 27 (2016): 7–50. 14 Connerton does not consider “historical reconstruction” to be “dependent on social memory.” See How Societies Remember,14. 15 It was always up to the audience to determine whether or not they should accept the truth of any historical statement. See Hughes, “Halldór Jakobsson” 10–11. 16 “We can refer to the structure of knowledge in this case as the ‘concretion of identity.’ With this we mean that a group bases its consciousness of unity and specificity upon this knowledge and derives formative and normative impulses from it, which allows the group to reproduce its identity” (Assmann, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity” 128). 17 Magnús Stephensen, “Formáli,” Guðmundur Jónsson, Sumar-Giøf handa Børnum (Leirárgarðir við Leirá: Hið íslenska landsuppfræðingarfélag, 1795), iii–x at iv. All translations from Icelandic and Danish are my own, but in the interest of space, the original texts are not given. 18 Terje Spurkland, “Lygisögur, skröksögur and stjúpmæðrasögur,” The Legendary Sagas: Origins and Development, ed. Annette Lassen et al. (Reykjavík: U of Iceland P, 2012), 173–84 at 176–77; Shaun F.D. Hughes, “The Old Norse Exempla as Arbiters of Gender Roles in Medieval Iceland,” New Norse Studies: Essays on the Literature and Culture of Medieval Scandinavia, ed. Jeffrey Turco (Ithaca: Cornell U Library, 2015), 255–300 at 264–71. 19 Annti Aarne, ed. and Stith Thompson, trans. & enlarg., The Types of the Folktale: A Classification and Bibliography, 2nd rev. ed. (Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemie, 1981). 20 Konráð Gíslason, “Fjölnir,” Fjölnir 4 (1838): I. 3–19 at 13. The volume numbers for Fjölnir are given in Arabic numerals, and the section numbers (often separately paginated) in Roman numerals. 21 That is, these narratives are in the form of rímur. 22 Acta Comitiorum generalium Islandiae: Alþingisbækur Íslands, ed. Jón Þorkelsson, et al., 17 vols. Reykjavík: Sögufélagið, 1912–1990, XII: 1741– 1750 (1973): 529–40 at 537. This Ordinance was printed at Hólar in 1746 and 1749. 23 In terms of cultural impact, Fjölnir is as important for Icelandic literature as The Spectator (1711–1712, 1714), founded by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele, or Athenäum (1798–1800), founded by August Wilhelm and Friedrich Schlegel, are for the literatures of Great Britain and Germany, respectively.

200  Shaun F.D. Hughes 24 For a brief survey of Fjölnir and its significance, see: Vilhjálmur Þ. Gíslason, Jónas Hallgrímsson og Fjölnir (Reykjavík: Almenna bókafélagið,1980), 90–98. 25 Even though Iceland is geographically part of Europe, and today also culturally a part of it, the same can hardly be said to have been the case at the beginning of the nineteenth century when it was still a dependency of Denmark. See Sumarliði R. Ísleifsson, “Within or Outside Europe? Modernists and Anti-modernists Visiting Iceland in the Mid-Nineteenth Century,” Northern Myths, Modern Identities, ed. Halink, 33–48. The reformers wanted to make Iceland more like mainland Europe economically and culturally, recognizing without articulating the fact, that “Europe” is not a unitary concept. See, Nere Basabe, “The Plural Meanings of Europe: A Historical Task,” The Meanings of Europe: Changes and Exchanges of a Contested Concept, ed. Claudia Wiesner and Meike Schmidt-Gleim (New York: Routledge, 2014), 19–32. 26 Dagný Kristjánsdóttir,“Skáldið eina: Um nokkur ljóð Jónasar Hallgrímssonar,” part 1, Tímarit Máls og Menningar 50 (1989): 172–87 at 176. 27 [Tómas Sæmundsson], “Fjölnir,” Fjölnir 1 (1835): I.1–17 at 8. 28 “Truthful” but not necessarily “true.” This is an ancient distinction between truth (sannindi) and verisimilitude (sannindalíkindi) which goes back to Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, [ed. Karl Hude], trans. Charles Forster Smith, Rev, ed., 4 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1921–1935), 1: 38–39 (Book I, chap. 22), where he makes a distinction between events which are described with akribeia (strict accuracy) and those recounted with alētheia (as most befitting the occasion). 29 [Tómas Sæmundsson], “Fjölnir,” 8–13. 30 The editors of Fjölnir saw their journal as a successor to the periodicals published by The Icelandic Society for National Enlightenment and run by the recently deceased reformer, Magnús Stephensen (†1833). [Tómas Sæmunds­ son], “Fjölnir,” 6–7. Therefore, it contained articles meant to inform and enlighten. In the first issue, the only literary pieces were an opening poem by Jónas Hallgrímsson, and the two concluding items. The first of these was a translation of most of “Schlußwort” (1830), from Heinrich Heine’s Nachträge zu den Reisebildern (1831; 2nd ed., 1833, Reisebilder. Vierter Teil). “Frá Hæni,” Fjölnir 1 (1835): II.140–44. See, Heinrich Heine, Werke, ed. Christoph Siegrist et al., 4 vols. (Frankfurt a.M.: Insel Verlag, 1994), 2:492–96 at 494–96. The second item was the translation of Tieck’s “Der blonde Eckbert.” 31 “Bemærkninger angaaende Islænderne, især i religiös Henseende,” Den Nordiske Kirke-Tidende 1.24–25 (1833): col. 389–93; 401–08. 32 The Danish original is in Müller, “Bemærkninger” col. 393. 33 In his review of “the Rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu, ‘composed by Sigurður Breiðfjörð,’” Jónas Hallgrímsson attacks the content of the rímur for general narrative incompetency, but he is much more concerned with the use of “distorted language” (bögumæli), “metrical fillers” (hortittur), and ill formed “genitive paraphrases” (kenningar). “Since rímur (in Iceland) are chanted, and have been chanted down to the present, then almost all of them are a disgrace to the Nation—there is no point in hiding it—and on top of that they cause a great deal of harm: they destroy and corrupt the feeling for that which is beautiful and poetic and that which serves good poetry well, and they employ on their behalf the ‘talent’ and the energy of many people who could have done something more useful—composed something rather better or then at the very least knitted harmless seaman’s socks while they were busy ‘composing drivel’ or ‘babbling incoherently’ to eternal mockery and ridicule

The Failure of Social Memory  201 throughout the entire world.” [Jónas Hallgrímsson,] “Um rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu ‘orktar af Sigurði Breiðfjörð’,” Fjölnir, 3 (1837): I.18–29 at 18. 34 Perhaps because they are reformers, they have added a utilitarian component to a Romantic sentiment known elsewhere as in the concluding lines of Keats’ “Ode on a Grecian Urn” (1820): “‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty,’—that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.” See John Keats, Poetical Works, ed. H. W. Garrod (London: Oxford UP, 1965), 209–10. Þórir Óskarsson, “‘Hið fagra, góða og sanna er eitt’: Tómas Sæmundsson og fagurfræði Fjölnis” Andvari 128 (2003): 90–110 argues that Tómas Sæmundsson’s concepts of truth and beauty are grounded in the works of Kant, Goethe, and Schiller. 35 The translation is usually attributed to both Jónas Hallgrímsson and Konráð Gíslason, but Bogi Th. Melsteð, “Athugasemd og leiðrjetting,” Tímarit Hins íslenzka bókmentafélags 14 (1893): 274, states: “On December 8, I spoke with him about Fjölnir and he then said these words: ‘The Ævintýr af Eggerti Glóa and Sagan af Arna-Birni og mér are by me.” The latter was an anecdote containing slang and Danish influenced Icelandic gleaned from the pages of the rival Reykjavík newspaper, Sunnanpóstur, and had appeared in Fjölnir 2 (1836): II.57–58. Björn M. Ólsen, “Athugasemd við athugasemdina hjer að framan,” Tímarit Hins íslenzka bókmentafélags 14 (1893): 275, rejects this and cites an equally impeccable source to argue that the anecdote is the work of Kristján Kristjánsson amtmaður (1806–1882) and Magnús Hákonarson (1812–1875), both of whom were students in Copenhagen at this time. See also Björn M. Ólsen, “Konráð Gíslason,” Tímarit Hins íslenzka bókmentafélags 12 (1891): 1–96 at 35. 36 Ludwig Tieck, “An A.W. Schlegel. Anstatt einer Vorrede,” FTA 6: 9–10 at 9. 37 “Ævintír af Eggèrti Glóa,” Fjölnir 1 (1835): II.145–70. This title has an archaic ring about it because the dative of the proper name is “Eggert” in Modern Icelandic rather than “Eggerti.” This is why I argue that the word ævintýr is also intended in the archaic meaning “exemplum” or “moral tale” although neither Jónas nor Konráð ever defended their use of the word in the title. 38 The term “Literary Fairy Tale” (Kunstmärchen) did not become available until the early twentieth century. See Mathias Mayer and Jens Tismar, Kunstmärchen, 4th ed. (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2003), 1–12. Even in Modern Icelandic it has proven difficult to come up with a term equivalent to Kunstmärchen. See Shaun F.D. Hughes, “Herder’s Influence on the First Published Collection of Icelandic Folklore: Íslenzk æfintýri (Reykjavík, 1852),” Herder in the Nineteenth Century, ed. Liisa Steinby (Heidelberg: Synchron, 2020), 381–97 at 387. 39 It is possible that Fölnir’s idiosyncratic spelling may have played a role in people not recognizing that by ævintýr he did not mean ævintýri. 40 See Sunnanpósturinn, 2 (1836), issues 1, 2, 4, 6, 10, 11, 12. This is the fullest contemporary discussion of the first issue of Fjölnir and its editors were far from happy with it as they end the second issue with reference to it: “Again, we intend to answer the laborer from Borgafjörður when he is done with his letter; because it does appear that he is not stupid and tolerably well read, according to the standards of those who are not educated—even though we know laborers who could have compiled a better letter.” “Auglísíngar,” Fjölnir 2 (1836): II.58–59 at 59. Calling the District Commissioner a “laborer” is a deliberate insult as the editors must have known the identity of “ein Borgfirðingur” as it was common knowledge. See Tómas Sæmundsson’s letter to Konráð Gíslason, August 1, 1836, Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar, 177–92 at 190. Furthermore, Tómas objected to the tone of the editors at this point

202  Shaun F.D. Hughes and believed that they should welcome criticism rather than hound their critics (Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar, 191). This advice they chose to ignore. 41 This cannot have been written in November 1835 as the sentence occurs in Fjölnir 2 (1836): I.40. 42 This issue also identifies the author simply as “E.” 43 “Úr brjefi af Austfjörðum,” Fjölnir 2 (1836): I.38–48. 44 Note the emphasis again on the utilitarian approach to literature. 45 Ólafur Indriðarson interprets ævintýr as ævintýri. 46 Note the emphasis on utility, not beauty, as the defining characteristic of a work. 47 Fjölnir 2 (1836): I.42. Kloppstokks Messías, trans. Jón Þorláksson (Copenhagen: Hið íslenzka bókmenntafélag, 1834–1838). Books 1–8 appeared in 1834 and books 9–20 in 1838 for a total of 922 closely printed pages of verse in double columns. J. Miltons Paradísar missir, trans. Jón Þorláksson (Copenhagen: n.p., 1828). 48 This was the second highest position in the government and was always an Icelander. He was subordinate to the Governor (Stiftamtmaður), always a Dane and usually resident in Copenhagen. 49 Arndís Hulda Auðunsdóttir, “‘Lítil sköpun þroska nær’ Rannsókn á mansöngvum Sigurðar Breiðfjörðs” (Unpublished M.A. Thesis, U of Iceland, 2015), 132 (the quotation in the title is from Sigurður Breiðfjörð, Rímur af Núma kóngi, 27, = ríma 3, stz. 1); Páll Valsson, “Að yrkja sig út úr bókmenntasögunni: Sigurður Breiðfjörð og Fjölnir,” Andvari 123 (1998): 58–67 at 62–63. Tómas Sæmundsson in a letter to Konráð Gíslason, August 1, 1836, reports that Sigurður admitted that he was paid to compose the poem, Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar 188. This is further confirmed by Gísli Konráðsson, Ævisaga Sigurðar Breiðfjörðs skálds, ed. Jóhann Gunnar Ólafsson (Ísafjörður: Prentstofan Ísrún, 1948), 88, although Gísli claims not to know who had commissioned the poem. The likelihood that Bjarni was behind it appears confirmed by two stanzas, the first of which is: “Hann vogar svo í hæl að bíta / höfðingja okkar Vesturlands, / reynandi til með lasti að Iýta / lofsælu bókasmíðar hans” (He [Fjölnir] dares to snap at the heels of our leader here in the West [Bjarni Thorarinsson], attempting with reproach to blemish his praiseworthy publication). While Sveinbjörn Sigurjónsson thinks it is unlikely that Bjarni commissioned the poem, “Inngangur,” Sigurður Breiðfjörð, Núma rímur, 3rd ed. (Reykjavík: Snæbjörn Jónsson, 1937), xi–lxiv at liii, the fact remains that Siguröur was always short of money. 50 Sigurður Breiðfjörð, “Fjölnis rjómi.” Ljóðasafn, ed. Sveinbjörn Sigurjónsson, 3 vols. (Reykjavík: Ísafold, 1951–1962), 1: 171–73 at 172 (stz. 11). 51 Sigurður Breiðfjörð, Ljóðasafn, 1: 186. This stanza which follows stanza 11 in many manuscripts was omitted in the printed version. Sigurður Breiðfjörð Ljóða smámunir (Tid-bits of Poetry), (Viðeyjarklaustur: Helgi Helgason, 1839), 16–18. 52 L. Tieck, Þrjú æfintýri, [ed. Steingrímur Thorsteinsson] (Reykjavík: Guðmundur Gamalíelsson, 1905), 109. This contained “Der blonde Eckbert” in the translation from Fjölnir, “Die Elfen,” translated by Steingrímur, and “Der Pokal” translated by Jón Þorleifsson (1825–1860), first published in 1858. One should note that when Jónas Guðlaugsson (1887–1916) reviewed this volume on Skírnir, there was not a negative word to be said about Tieck or his ævintýri. See, Jónas Guðlaugsson (1887–1916), “L. Tieck, Þrjú æfintýri […],” Skírnir 80 (1906): 87–88. 53 Despite the claim of being disinterested in responding to the lampoon, the planning, if not the writing of Jónas Hallgrímsson’s blistering review of

The Failure of Social Memory  203 Sigurður’s Rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu which would appear in the next issue of Fjölnir, is likely to have already been underway. 54 Árni Helgason “Útkomnar íslendskar bækur á seirni árum,” Sunnanpósturinn 1.9 (Sept. 1835): 129–34 at 133. 55 [Árni Helgason,] [“Án titils,”] Sunnanpósturinn 2.2 (Feb. 1836): 17–19 at 18. 56 “It seemed to me very hurtful, that you deprived me of a suitable occasion, and made useless the great trouble I took, when you omitted everything which was said about the rímur … I think I understand that you had not wanted to vindicate the praise of Sigurður Breiðfjörð [in Sunnanpósturinn], but it could have diminished it a little.” Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar 187. 57 Specifically, [Konráð Gíslason,] “Þáttur umm stafsetníng 1,” Fjölnir 2 (1836): I.3–37; “Þáttur um stafsetning 2,” Fjölnir 3 (1837): I.5–18. On this spelling system, see the essays in Gunnlaugur Ingólfsson, Fjölnisstafsetningin: Hliðarspor í sögu íslenskrar stafsetningar (Reykjavík: Stofnun Árna Magnússonar í íslenskum fræði, 2017). 58 [Jónas Hallgrímsson,] “Saknaðarljóð,” Fjölnir 3 (1837): I.3–4; “Fíkur yfir hæðir,” Fjölnir 3 (1837): I.30–32. 59 [Jónas Hallgrímsson,] “Um rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu.” 60 For a comprehensive survey of this affair and its aftermath see Arndís Hulda Auðunsdóttir, “‘Lítil sköpun þroska nær’,” 131–47; Páll Valsson, “Að yrkja sig út úr bókmenntasögunn”: Vilhjálmur Þ. Gíslason, Jónas Hallgrímsson 99–107; Aðalgeir Kristjánsson, Síðasti Fjölnismaðurinn: Ævi Konráðs Gíslasonar (Reykjavík: Skrudda, 2003), 64–66; Auður Aðalsteinsdóttir, Þvílíkar ófreskjur – Vald og virkni ritdóma á íslensku bókmenntasviði (Selfoss: Sæmundur, 2021). 61 Arndís Hulda Auðunsdóttir, “‘Lítil sköpun þroska nær’,” 140–45; Matthew J. Driscoll, “Tistrand og Indiana in Iceland,” The Arthur of the North: The Arthurian Legend in the Norse and Rus’ Realms, ed. Marianne Kalinke (Cardiff: U of Wales Press, 2011), 189–92. The traditional poet, Niels Jónsson (1782–1857), was so upset at the shortcomings of Sigurður’s poem, that he sat down and composed his own set of rímur based on the same story. 62 Jón Borgfirðingur, Stutt æfiminning Sigurðar Breiðfjörð ar skálds. (Reykjavík: Einar Þorðarson, 1878), 29. Björn M. Ólsen denied that Jónas would have so acted out of such personal (and petty) motives (“Gísli Konráðsson,” 28) and Vilhjálmur Þ. Gíslason, Jónas Hallgrímsson 102, agrees, but the evidence suggests otherwise, especially in the light of what appears to be Jónas’ deeply felt personal animosity towards Sigurður. 63 Sveinbjörn Sigurjónsson, “Inngangur,” Sigurður Breiðfjörð, Núma rímur lii–liii. 64 Sigurður Breiðfjörð “Andsvar til Fjölnis,” Ljóðasafn 3: 160–66. 65 After all his father, Gísli Konráðsson (1787–1877), is one of the most important Icelandic “barefoot historians” of the nineteenth century. The fact that Jónas was in Iceland at the time volume 4 was being prepared (Aðalgeir Kristjánsson, Síðasti Fjölnismaðurinn 55) means that Konráð is the sole author of the defense. 66 As later formulted by Friedrich Nietzsche, “Vom Nutzen und Nachteile der Historie,” Werke, ed. Karl Schlechta, 4 vols. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1997), 1: 208–85 at 212. 67 An excellent example of this is the poem “Gunnarshólmi,” which appeared in Fjölnir 4 (1838): I.31–34, the same issue. For an insightful analysis of how this works as a political “site of memory,” see Vanessa K. Iacocca, “Saga-sites of Memory: Jónas Hallgrímsson, Icelandic Nationalism, and the Íslendingasögur,” Scandinavian-Canadian Studies, 28 (2021): 260–89.

204  Shaun F.D. Hughes 68 On the politics of forgetting, see Vincent J. Cheng, Amnesia and the Nation: History, Forgetting, and James Joyce (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), 1–42. 69 In order to save space, Konráð’s argument is paraphrased rather than translated. The paraphrased passages are given in italics. 70 “[F]ramtakssemi og kjænsku.” This phrase is in quotation marks, but I have been unable to identify a source. By “artfulness” is probably meant the metrical and rhetorical complexities of the rímur where form is often more important than content. 71 What Konráð has done here is to change the meaning of saga. It will become clear that he is not referring to “history,” but the historical novel, or perhaps even fiction in general. 72 In Connerton’s terms, the poet uses an “inscribing practice” to store and retrieve information (How Societies Remember 73). 73 Konráð uses a new word and it would have made little or no sense to the traditional audience. It is not found in Björn Halldórsson, Orðabók: Íslensk— Latnesk—Dönsk, ed. Jón Aðalsteinn Jónsson (1814. Reykjavík: Orðabók Háskólans, 1992). Konráð’s definition applies to academic history which where it existed at the time was written in Latin or Danish, not Icelandic. 74 This anticipates Connerton who argues that “historical reconstruction” is not “dependent on social memory” (How Societies Remember 14). 75 There is a certain amount of irony in this, because Gísli Konráðsson was a traditional poet who composed rímur as well as “traditional sagas.” See Hughes, “A Never-Ending Story,” 102–05. 76 This concept was foreign to most Icelanders who were unaware of James Macpherson and Ossian or the phenomenon of the Gothic novel. The closest thing they had were the “ævintýri.” 77 The invocation of the French Revolution here highlights Konráð’s dilemma. People throughout Europe are now interested in defining a sense of national identity by means of their folk literature guided by understanding scholars and writers. Icelanders have a sense of national identity and a prominent and active folk literature but refuse to accept the guidance of the intellectual elite. 78 See Guðmundur Hálfdanarson, “From Linguistic Patriotism to Cultural Nationalism: Language and Identity in Iceland,” Languages and Identities in Historical Perspective, ed. Ann Katherine Isaacs (Pisa: Edizioni Plus – Università di Pisa, 2005), 5–66. 79 Here Konráð seems to be blurring his categories in praising Scott for his use of “historical imagination,” whereas Scott also based his stories on previous narrative sources or “historical memory.” He writes historical fiction, not historical fantasy. 80 This is not something that many traditional Icelanders would have agreed with because they would have considered these stories ævintýri, not “history” (saga). 81 In fact, this had already begun. In 1817 the Royal Commission for the Conservation of Antiquates (Den kongelige Commission til Oldsagers Opbevaring) had distributed 300 copies of a printed questionnaire in Icelandic intended for distribution to the parish parsons. Between 1818 and 1823 172 responses were received. See Hughes, “Assembling Memory: The Questionnaire of 1817,” 305. 82 Aleida Assmann identifies this move, “dispersed in forgotten depots,” as one of the passive forms of cultural forgetting. “Canon and Archive,” A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies, ed. Astrid Erll and Ansgar Nünning (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010), 97–107 at 99. Even though it is not active like “material destruction” or “censorship,” it can be equally politically motivated as here.

The Failure of Social Memory  205 83 There is also a slight disconnect here because Tieck published his Märchen in 1797 and the first edition of the Kinder- und Hausmärchen of the Brothers Grimm was published in 1812. Konráð also seems to have access to a copy of the section on German literature from the travel journal of Tómas Sæmundsson written in 1835. There it says: “One of the most celebrated of them is Tieck in Dresden … He is some kind of German Walter Scott and has selected his material from the antiquities and histories of Germany and clad it in a modern dress in poems and Märchen.” Ferðabók Tómasar Sæmundssonar, ed. Jakob Benediktsson (Reykjavík: Félagsprentsmiðjan, 1947), 123. 84 Konráð has changed the title by putting a suffixed definite article on the first word and obscuring whether the base form is “ævintýr” (as in the original), or “ævintýri” the form he is using in this defense. 85 While there are two fragmentary Kunstmärchen by Jónas Hallgrímsson in the last issue of Fjölnir 9 (1847): 9–24 and 28–34, the genre never really took root in Iceland. See Hughes, “Herder’s Influence” 387, 390. 86 The name given to the period 1220–1264 which was in fact a civil war which ended with Iceland losing its independence and becoming a vassal of the Norwegian crown. 87 Again, Konráð is eliding the difference between “historical memory” and “historical imagination.” 88 This sentence summarizes the admonition of the old lady to Bertha in “Der blonde Eckbert”: FTA, 6: 135–36; Fjölnir 1 (1835): 157. It is repeated here as part of the argument to bolster the claim that the story is “history” and therefore, useful. 89 In my copy of Páll Sigurðsson, Adalsteinn: saga æskumanns (Akureyri: Jónas Sveinsson, 1877), someone has written very carefully in ink in a contemporary hand Skaldsaga (Novel) under the word saga in the title.

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206  Shaun F.D. Hughes Bandlien, Bjørn. “History.” Handbook of Pre–Modern Nordic Memory Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Ed. Jürg Glauser, Pernille Hermann, and Stephen A. Mitchell. 2 vols. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2018. 1: 303–17. Basabe, Nere. “The Plural Meanings of Europe: A Historical Task.” The Meanings of Europe: Changes and Exchanges of a Contested Concept. Ed. Claudia Wiesner and Meike Schmidt-Gleim. Routledge Advances in Sociology 118. New York: Routledge, 2014. 19–32. Borgfirðingur, Jón. Stutt æfiminning Sigurðar Breiðfjörð ar skálds. Reykjavík: Einar Þorðarson, 1878. Breiðfjörð, Sigurður. “Andsvar til Fjölnis.” Ljóðasafn. Ed. Sveinbjörn Sigurjónsson. 3 vols. Reykjavík: Ísafold, 1951–1962. 3: 160–66 ———. “Fjölnis rjómi.” Ljóðasafn. Ed. Sveinbjörn Sigurjónsson. 3 vols. Reykjavík: Ísafold, 1951–1962. 1: 171–73. ———. Rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu. Copenhagen: S. L. Møller, 1831. ———. Rímur af Svoldar Bardaga. Viðey: Helgi Helgason, 1833. ———. “Fjölnis rjómi.” Ljóða smámunir. Viðeyjarklaustur: Helgi Helgason, 1839. 16–18. ———. Rímur af Núma kóngi Pompílssyni. Viðey: Helgi Helgason, 1835. Cheng, Vincent J. Amnesia and the Nation: History, Forgetting, and James Joyce. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018 Connerton, Paul. How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989. Driscoll, Matthew J. “The Long and Winding Road: Manuscript Culture in Late Pre-Modern Iceland.” White Field, Black seeds: Nordic Literacy Practices in the Long Nineteenth Century. Ed. Anna Kuismin and Matthew J. Driscoll. Studia Fennica Literaria 7. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society, 2013. 50–63. ——— “Tistrand og Indiana in Iceland.” The Arthur of the North: The Arthurian Legend in the Norse and Rus’ Realms. Ed. Marianne Kalinke. Arthurian Literature of the Middle Ages 5. Cardiff: U of Wales P, 2011. 189–92. Frye, Northrop. The Secular Scripture: A Study of the Structure of Romance. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1975. Gíslason, Konráð. “Fjölnir.” Fjölnir 4 (1838): I.3–19. ———. “Þáttur umm stafsetníng 1.” Fjölnir 2 (1836): I.3–37. ———. “Þáttur um stafsetning 2.” Fjölnir 3 (1837): I.5–18. Gíslason, Vilhjálmur Þ. Jónas Hallgrímsson og Fjölnir. Reykjavík: Almenna bókafélagið, 1980. Guðlaugsson, Jónas. “L. Tieck, Þrjú æfintýri […]” Skírnir 80 (1906): 87–88. Gunnlaugsson, Gylfi. “Norse Myths, Nordic Identities: The Divergent Case of Icelandic Romanticism.” Nordic Myths, Modern Identities: The Nationalization of Nordic Mythologies since 1800. Ed. Simon Halink. National Cultivation of Culture 19. Leiden: Brill, 2019. 73–86. Guttormsson, Loftur. Childhood, Youth and Upbringing in the Age of Absolutism. Trans. Keneva Kunz. Reykjavík: Iceland UP, 2017. Hálfdanarson, Guðmundur. “From Linguistic Patriotism to Cultural Nationalism: Language and Identity in Iceland.” Languages and Identities in Historical Perspective. Ed. Ann Katherine Isaacs. Pisa: Edizioni Plus – Università di Pisa, 2005. 5–66. Halldórsson, Björn. Orðabók: Íslensk—Latnesk—Dönsk. Ed. Jón Aðalsteinn Jónsson. Orðabækur fyrri alda 2. Reykjavík: Orðabók Háskólans, 1992. First published, Copenhagen 1814.

The Failure of Social Memory  207 Hallgrímsson, Jónas. “Fíkur yfir hæðir.” Fjölnir 3 (1837a): I.30–32. ———. “Um rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu ‘orktar af Sigurði Breiðfjörð’.” Fjölnir, 3 (1837c): I.18–29. ———. “Gunnarshólmi.” Fjölnir 4 (1838): I.31–34. ———. “Grasaferð.” Fjölnir 9 (1847a): 9–24. ———. “Hreiðars-Hóll.” Fjölnir 9 (1847b): 28–34. ———. “Saknaðarljóð.” Fjölnir 3 (1837b): I.3–4. Heine, Heinrich. “Schlußwort” (1830). Nachträge zu den Reisebildern (1831; 2nd ed., 1833, Reisebilder. Vierter Teil). Werke. Ed. Christoph Siegrist et al. 4 vols. Frankfurt am Main: Insel Verlag, 1994. 2:492–96 at 494–96. ———. “Frá Hæni.” Fjölnir 1 (1835): II.140–44. Helgason, Árni. “Án titils.” Sunnanpósturinn 2.2 (February 1836): 17–19. ———. “Útkomnar íslendskar bækur á seirni árum.” Sunnanpósturinn 1.9 (September 1835): 129–34. Helgason, Jón Karl. “Der Blonde Eckbert in an Alien Polysystem: The Reception of Tieck’s “skröksaga” in 19th-Century Iceland.” Textual Production and Status Contests in Rising and Unstable Societies. Ed. Massimiliano Bampi and Marina Buzzoni. Filologie medievali e moderne 2: Serie occidentale 2. Venice: Edizioni Ca’ Foscari, 2013. 115–26. Helgason, Þórður. “Rímnamál.” Són 9 (2011): 75–113. Hughes, Shaun F. D. “‘A Never-Ending Story’: History, Saga, and Secondary Creation.” From Rus’ to Rímur: Norse History, Culture, and Literature East and West. Ed. Shaun F. D. Hughes and Allyn K. Peason. Islandica 64: An Issue of New Norse Studies. Ithaca: Cornell U Library, 2023. 85–125. ———. “Assembling Memory: The Questionnaire of 1817 from Den kongelige Commission til Oldsagers Opbevaring and the Origins of Icelandic Romantic Nationalism.” Myth, Magic, and Memory in Early Scandinavian Narrative Culture. Studies in Honour of Stephen A. Mitchell. Ed. Jürg Glauser and Pernille Hermann. Acta Scandinavica. Cambridge Studies in the Early Scandinavian World 11. Turnhout, Brepols, 2021. 301–20. ———. “Halldór Jakobsson on Truth and Fiction in the Sagas (1789).” Gripla 27 (2016): 7–50. ———. “Herder’s Influence on the First Published Collection of Icelandic Folklore: Íslenzk æfintýri (Reykjavík, 1852).” Herder in the Nineteenth Century. Ed. Liisa Steinby. Heidelberg: Synchron, 2020. 381–97. ———. “The Old Norse Exempla as Arbiters of Gender Roles in Medieval Iceland.” New Norse Studies: Essays on the Literature and Culture of Medieval Scandinavia. Ed. Jeffrey Turco. Islandica 58. Ithaca: Cornell U Library, 2015. 255–300. Iacocca, Vanessa K. “Saga-sites of Memory: Jónas Hallgrímsson, Icelandic Nationalism, and the Íslendingasögur.” Scandinavian-Canadian Studies, 28 (2021): 260–89. Indriðarson, Ólafur. “Úr brjefi af Austfjörðum.” Fjölnir 2 (1836): I.38–48. Ingólfsson, Gunnlaugur. Fjölnisstafsetningin: Hliðarspor í sögu íslenskrar stafsetningar. Rit 94. Reykjavík: Stofnun Árna Magnússonar í íslenskum fræði, 2017. Ísleifsson, Sumarliði R. “Within or Outside Europe? Modernists and Antimodernists Visiting Iceland in the Mid-Nineteenth Century“ Nordic Myths, Modern Identities: The Nationalization of Nordic Mythologies since 1800. Ed. Simon Halink. National Cultivation of Culture 19. Leiden: Brill, 2019. 33–48.

208  Shaun F.D. Hughes Keats, John. Poetical Works. Ed. H. W. Garrod. Oxford Standard Authors. London: Oxford UP, 1965. Klopstock, Friedrich Gottlieb. Kloppstokks Messías. Trans. Jón Þorláksson. Copenhagen: Hið íslenzka bókmenntafélag, 1834–1838. Konráðsson, Gísli. Ævisaga Sigurðar Breiðfjörðs skálds. Ed. Jóhann Gunnar Ólafsson. Ísafjörður: Prentstofan Ísrún, 1948. Kremer, Detlef. “Frühes Erzählen (Auftragsarbeiten, Kunstmärchen).” Ludwig Tieck: Leben—Werk—Wirkung. Ed. Claudia Stockinger and Stefan Scherer. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2011. 498–514. Kristjánsdóttir, Dagný. “Skáldið eina: Um nokkur ljóð Jónasar Hallgrímssonar.” Part 1. Tímarit Máls og Menningar 50 (1989): 172–87; Reprinted in Undirstraumar: greinar og fyrirlestir. Reykjavík: Háskólaútgáfan, 1999. 15–18. Kristjánsson, Aðalgeir. Síðasti Fjölnismaðurinn: Ævi Konráðs Gíslason ar. Reykjavík: Skrudda, 2003. Magnússon, Sigurður Gylfi and Davíð Ólafsson. “‘Barefoot Historians’: Education in Iceland in the Modern Period.” Writing Peasants: Studies on Peasant Literacy in Early Modern Northern Europe. Ed. Klaus-Joachim Lorenzen-Schmidt and Bjørn Poulsen. Keterminde: Landbohistorisk Selskab, 2002. 175–202. ———. Minor Knowledge and Microhistory: Manuscript Culture in the Nineteenth Century. London: Routledge, 2017. Mayer, Mathias, and Jens Tismar. Kunstmärchen. 4th ed. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2003. Melsteð, Bogi Th. “Athugasemd og leiðrjetting.” Tímarit Hins íslenzka bókmentafélags 14 (1893): 274. Milton, John. J. Miltons Paradísar missir. Trans. Jón Þorláksson. Copenhagen: n.p., 1828. Müller, Ludvig Christian. “Athugasemdir um Íslendínga, eínkum í trúarefnum.” Fjölnir 1 (1835): I.32–47. ———. “Bemærkninger angaaende Islænderne, især i religiös Henseend.” Den Nordiske Kirke-Tidende 1.24–25 (1833): col. 389–93; 401–08. ———. Islandsk Læsebog med tilhørende Ordforklaring. Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1837. Nietzsche, Friedrich. “Vom Nutzen und Nachteile der Historie.” Werke. Ed. Karl Schlechta. 4 vols. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1997. 1: 208–85. O’Connor, Ralph. “History or Fiction? Truth-Claims and Defensive Narrators in Icelandic Romance-Sagas.” Medieval Scandinavia 15 (2005): 101–69. Ólsen, Björn M. “Athugasemd við athugasemdina hjer að framan.” Tímarit Hins íslenzka bókmentafélags 14 (1893): 275. ——— “Konráð Gíslason.” Tímarit Hins íslenzka bókmentafélags 12 (1891): 1–96. Óskarsson, Þórir. “From Romanticism to Realism.” Trans. Gunnþórunn Guðmundsdóttir. A History of Icelandic Literature. Ed. Daisy Neijmann. Histories of Scandinavian Literatures 5. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 2006, 251–307. ———. “‘Hið fagra, góða og sanna er eitt’: Tómas Sæmundsson og fagurfræði Fjölnis.” Andvari 128 (2003): 90–110. Sæmundsson, Tómas. Bréf Tómasar Sæmundssonar. Ed. Jón Helgason. Reykjavík: Sigurður Kristjánsson, 1907.

The Failure of Social Memory  209 ———. Ferðabók Tómasar Sæmundssonar. Ed. Jakob Benediktsson. Reykjavík: Félagsprentsmiðjan, 1947. ———. “Fjölnir.” Fjölnir 1 (1835): I.1–17. Sigurðsson, Páll. Adalsteinn: saga æskumanns. Akureyri: Jónas Sveinsson, 1877. Sigurjónsson, Sveinbjörn. “Inngangur.” Sigurður Breiðfjörð. Núma rímur. 3rd ed. Reykjavík: Snæbjörn Jónsson, 1937. xi–lxiv. Spurkland, Terje. “Lygisögur, skröksögur and stjúpmæðrasögur.” The Legendary Sagas: Origins and Development. Ed. Annette Lassen, Agneta Ney and Ármann Jakobsson. Reykjavík: U of Iceland P, 2012. 173–84. Stephensen, Magnús. “Ágrip um þær nyjustu Frønsku Stiornar-biltíngar.” Minnisverð Tíðindi 1 (1796–1798): 1–120. ———. “Formáli.” Guðmundur Jónsson. Sumar-Giøf handa Børnum. Leirárgarðir við Leirá: Hið íslenska landsuppfræðingarfélag, 1795. [iii–x]. [Sverrisson, Eiríkur]. “Sendibréfs eins Borgfyrðíngs dat. 20ta Nóv. 1835.” Sunnanpósturinn 2 (1836): 1 (January), 4–9; 2 (February), 23–28; 4 (April), 62–64; 6 (June), 89–90; 10 (October), 155–60; 11 (November), 170–73; 12 (December), 185–89. Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War. [Ed. Karl Hude]. Trans. Charles Forster Smith. Rev, ed. 4 vols. Loeb Classical Library 108–10, 169. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1921–1935. Tieck, Ludwig. “Ævintír af Eggèrti Glóa.” [Trans. Jónas Hallgrímsson and Konráð Gíslason.] Fjölnir 1 (1835): II.145–70. ———. “An A. W. Schlegel. Anstatt einer Vorrede.” Phantasus. Ed. Manfred Frank. Ludwig Tieck. Schriften in zwölf Bänden. (Frankfurt: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985), 6 (1985a): 9–10. ———. “Der blonde Eckbert.” Phantasus. Ed. Manfred Frank. Ludwig Tieck. Schriften in zwölf Bänden. (Frankfurt: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985), 6 (1985b): 126–48. ———. Phantasus. Eine Sammlung von Mährchen, Erzählungen, Schauspielen und Novellen. 3 vols. Berlin: Realschulbuchhandlung, 1812. Tieck, Ludwig. Peter Leberecht. Volksmährchen. 3 vols. Berlin: Karl August Nicolai, 1797. Tieck, Ludwig. Þrjú æfintýri. [Ed. Steingrímur Thorsteinsson.] Reykjavík: Guðmundur Gamalíelsson, 1905. Ullrich, Volker. “Spuren im Alltag. ‘Barfußhistoriker’—woher sie kommen und was sie wollen.” Die Zeit 45 (November 2, 1984): 73. Valsson, Páll. “Að yrkja sig út úr bókmenntasögunni: Sigurður Breiðfjörð og Fjölnir.” Andvari 123 (1998): 58–67.

9 Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials Cultural Memory and Heinrich Heine Bartell Berg

Andreas Huyssen, in his work Present Pasts: Urban Palimpsests and the Politics of Memory, refers directly to Romantic memory as he explains two contrasting modes of connection between the present and the past. If the Romantics thought that memory bound us in some deep sense to times past, with melancholia being one of its liminal manifestations, then today we rather think of memory as a mode of re-presentation and as belonging ever more to the present. After all, the act of remembering is always in and of the present, while its referent is of the past and thus absent. (3–4) In contrast to the melancholic longing of Romantic memory, i.e., an experience of loss and an unfulfillable longing for that which has been lost, memory today rests on a shifting foundation of re-presentations and renegotiations that cast history through the gaze of the present. While previous chapters in this volume have addressed memory primarily within the Romantic period, this chapter approaches memory and German Romanticism from a different perspective, insofar as it explores contemporary issues and concepts of memory in relation to the Romantic poet Heinrich Heine. In analyzing how Heine has been remembered and memorialized in Germany and beyond, the chapter sets past and present in dialogue and explores how memorials to Heinrich Heine have reflected shifting constructions of German and German American cultural memory. In order to understand Heine’s role as a cultural figure and his place in German and German American cultural memory, it is useful to define the concept and differentiate it from related terms, e.g., collective identity and collective memory. The term “collective memory” in the European tradition has its roots in the work of Emile Durkheim and especially in that of his student, Maurice Halbwachs, whose books Les cadres sociaux de la mémoire (1925) and La mémoire collective (1950) theorize and elucidate memory from a social perspective. DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-13

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  211 In “Between History and Memory: Les Lieux de Memoire” (1989) and in his larger work Realms of Memory: Rethinking the French Past (1998), the French historian Pierre Nora further develops Halbwachs’ theory of collective memory and differentiates collective memory from both the memory of the individual and from history. Pointing to an aggregation of memory into a collective memory as an actual organic entity, Nora associates the collective memory with three concepts: the remnants of experience (whether traditional, customary, or ancestral), collectively remembered values, and traditional but unspoken skills (“Between History and Memory” 7–13). In a similar manner, Gaston Bachelard connected the notion of collective memory with spatiality in The Poetics of Space (1958). As Bachelard argued, “Memories are motionless, and the more securely they are fixed in space, the sounder they are” (9). While Bachelard’s concept of collective memory relates primarily to intimate places, e.g., the cellar, the attic, and the home, his notion illuminates the essential connection between memory and space. Building upon Aby Warburg’s notion of social memory, Jan and Aleida Assmann describe “das kulturelle Gedächtnis” (“cultural memory”) as a form of collective memory closely knit to collective identity. In Communicative and Cultural Memory, Jan Assmann explains, Cultural memory is a form of collective memory, in the sense that it is shared by a number of people and that it conveys to these people a collective, that is, cultural, identity. Halbwachs, however, the inventor of the term ‘collective memory,’ was careful to keep his concept of collective memory apart from the realm of traditions, transmissions, and transferences which we propose to subsume under the term ‘cultural memory.’ (110) Assmann supposes external institutions and social structures that preserve and re-embody cultural memory across generational lines. As Assmann also notes, cultural memory is a structure that conveys a common collective identity, i.e., the members of a cultural group derive a group identity in part through the collective construction of cultural memory. Whereas Halbwachs and Nora exclude transmission via literary and other symbolic means and focus instead on memory that is somehow stored in remnants, values, and unspoken skills, Assmann’s concept of cultural memory illuminates the construction of cultural identity in the formation of memory. Cultural memory, Assmann notes, is exteriorized, objectified, and stored away in symbolic forms that, unlike the sounds of words or the sight of gestures, are stable and situation-transcendent: They may be transferred from one situation to another and transmitted from one generation to another. (111)

212  Bartell Berg These symbolic forms serve both to constitute and preserve cultural memory, and they become “even more important, because groups which, of course, do not ‘have’ a memory tend to ‘make’ themselves one by means of things meant as reminders such as monuments, museums, libraries, archives, and other mnemonic institutions” (111). Cultural identity, therefore, relies on the durable impact of these mnemonic institutions, which individual members of the culture may understand as representative symbolic elements. The Heine Memorial in New York serves as such a mnemonic institution, a symbol of German American identity that celebrates Heine’s poetic voice and his striving for literary and intellectual freedom. As later discussions will illustrate, the placement of the memorial in New York, its ceremonial unveiling, and the attendance by prominent German Americans and thousands of citizens at the festivities performatively construct a German American identity, and the memorial reinforces that identity in an enduring symbolic form that nonetheless is subject to the vicissitudes of time and cultural shifts. While Assmann’s concept of cultural memory is especially useful for understanding the symbolic meaning and impact of the aforementioned cultural institutions, shifting geographical and cultural identities challenge the assertion that these symbolic forms are stable and situationtranscendent. Indeed, as Andreas Huyssen points out, those formerly stable links have weakened today to the extent that national traditions and historical pasts are increasingly deprived of their geographic and political groundings, which are re-organized in the processes of cultural globalization. This may mean that these groundings are written over, erased, and forgotten, as the defenders of local heritage and national authenticity lament. Or it may mean that they are being renegotiated in the clash between globalizing forces and new productions and practices of local cultures. (4) This renegotiation of these institutions and symbolic forms, if one sets Huyssen’s and Assmann’s theories in dialogue, may thus result in cultural palimpsests, which accumulate layers of cultural significance while simultaneously re-signifying and re-setting the cultural symbols. This is evidenced by the shift from the nineteenth-century German discourse regarding the rejection of a Heine memorial to the twentieth-century restoration of the memorial in New York, as discussed later. From the funding, placing, and unveiling of the Heine Memorial in New York to its shifting significance in the twentieth century, the memorial as a cultural palimpsest points to the historical, geographical, political, and social shifts in German and German American culture. While exploring the Heine Memorial through the lens of this discourse, this chapter highlights the tensions and ambiguities at its creation, for these tensions undermine notions of an ostensible stable homogeneous German American cultural identity. They point instead to a

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  213 more complex process of shifts and renegotiations, or, as the Heine Memorial demonstrates, rejections, embraces, and renovations. Although this chapter primarily explores the shifting and renegotiation of cultural memory vis-à-vis the Heine Memorial in New York, a short analysis of one symbolic Heine poem offers a point of departure and also connects this chapter and the discussion of cultural memory to Heine’s literary works. Indeed, as Dietrich Schubert argues, the marble tomb that was erected at Heine’s grave in 1901 may represent a substitute for the memorial denied to Heine in Düsseldorf and in Mainz (67). The poem is engraved in the marble of Heine’s tomb in Paris in the Catholic cemetery in Montmartre, and, while it was written by the author, it was only published posthumously. Nevertheless, the stone reminder of Heine’s poetic voice seems fitting. Visitors to Heine’s grave find the following epitaph: Wo wird einst des Wandermüden Letzte Ruhestätte sein Unter Palmen in dem Süden? Unter Linden an dem Rhein? Werd ich wo in einer Wüste Eingescharrt von fremder Hand? Oder ruh ich an der Küste Eines Meeres in dem Sand? Immerhin! Mich wird umgeben Gotteshimmel, dort wie hier, Und als Totenlampen schweben Nachts die Sterne über mir. (DHA supp. 2, 197) Wander-weary, where will I Find that final rest of mine? Where the Southern palms soar high? Under lindens on the Rhine? Will I die in some wild land Buried by a stranger, or Will I rest beneath the sand Of some distant ocean shore? Well, no matter! God's same sky Will be round me, there as here, And at night the stars on high Will be lamps to light my bier. (Draper 806)

214  Bartell Berg In this poem, the reader experiences Heine’s romantic pathos, his cosmopolitan worldliness, and an ironic realism that characterize much of Heine’s poetic oeuvre. Standard tropes of Romantic poetry, e.g., the wanderer, the linden trees, the heavens, and the stars all appear in the poem. Wandering and longing feature heavily in Romantic texts such as Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen, Chamisso’s Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte, and Eichendorff’s Ahnung und Gegenwart.1 Linden trees with their heart-shaped leaves were frequent symbols of both nature and love in Romanticism, and the heavens and stars represent the longing for the infinite and the simultaneous experience of liminality. While the final stanza resolves some of the tension, the poem begins with the unknown. Most notably, in the first two stanzas, the author expresses an inability to know his place of final repose. The lyrical subject wonders longingly where he, the wanderer, will find rest. By contrast, the third stanza begins with the caesura Well, no matter! and reverses the Romantic pathos of the earlier two stanzas while articulating a cosmopolitan worldly vision in which one overarching starry heaven transcends geographical borders. Heine’s poem, known simply as “Wo?” (“Where?”) introduces but also resolves the subject’s tension; pondering gives way to comfort in the knowledge that any final place of burial will remain under the same starry sky. Although one cannot conflate the author with the lyrical subject, one notes that Heine’s own grave and burial in Montmartre illustrate a similar turn from Romantic yearning to stoic realism. One can easily imagine the author Heine pondering his own burial and taking comfort that the same sky covers both Paris and Düsseldorf, Heine’s birth city. While the lyrical subject in the poem moves from pathos and longing towards resolution and realism, Heine’s own life, death, and burial reveal a similar pattern. The author, in exile in Paris from 1831 until his death, repeatedly wrote of a longing for his homeland and the impossible fulfillment of that longing, which persist at the core of many of Heine’s works. Heine’s burial exhibits his own ultimate realism, like that of the lyrical subject, as Heine made specific preparations for his interment, requesting a modest burial in Montmartre, stipulating no eulogies, and no clergy present (Heine, “Testament” 321). The poem on Heine’s grave is especially fitting for the Romantic poet; it mirrors the longing tone of another well-known Heine poem from his Book of Songs: Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam Im Norden auf kahler Höh. Ihn schläfert; mit weißer Decke Umhüllen ihn Eis und Schnee. Er träumt von einer Palme, Die, fern im Morgenland,

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  215 Einsam und schweigend trauert Auf brennender Felsenwand. (DHA 1/1, 165) A pine is standing lonely In the North on a bare plateau. He sleeps; a bright white blanket Enshrouds him in ice and snow. He’s dreaming of a palm tree Far away in the Eastern land Lonely and silently mourning On a sunburnt rocky strand. (Draper 62) In both poems, the lyrical subject expresses a longing that somehow bridges vast distances, symbolized in both poems by the juxtaposition of trees. The palm tree, associated with the East, i.e., the Middle East, is juxtaposed with the lindens on the Rhine in “Where?” while a lonely pine tree stands as the palm’s counterpart in the latter poem. Indeed, the voice of longing and memory is a frequent theme, especially in Book of Songs, while Heine’s satire and irony come more to the fore in Germany, a Winter’s Tale and elsewhere. Beyond the tension between comfort and the unknown in “Where?,” Heine’s Parisian grave illustrates the complexity of remembering and memorializing the poet; the author’s criticism of the German state in an age of burgeoning nationalism, his choice to live in exile in Paris, and his Jewish heritage all fanned the flames of controversy surrounding his memorials. The Heine memorials and the debates surrounding them also illustrate the importance of memory and its ability to “mobilize and monumentalize national and universal pasts so as to legitimize and give meaning to the present and to envision the future: culturally, politically, and socially” (Huyssen 2). Although Heine memorials by themselves are not necessarily metonymic symbols for national culture, as they could stand simply as symbols of reverence for his poetic voice or the person of Heinrich Heine, they nonetheless function as common points of reference for the formation of cultural identity, as the analysis later in this chapter will show. At the end of the nineteenth century and during the first half of the twentieth century, memorials in Heinrich Heine’s birthplace of Düsseldorf as well as in Hamburg, the city of his publisher, Campe Verlag, were controversial and often rejected. In Düsseldorf prominent members of society including the mayor, well-known jurists, bankers, and members of the aristocracy began in the fall of 1887 to call for the building of a Heine monument. Perhaps the most prominent member of the committee—not a Düsseldorfer but a devoted admirer of Heine, Empress Elisabeth of

216  Bartell Berg Austria-Hungary—composed a poem in his honor that specifically envisions Heine’s poetry singing to “German hearts” and “German sisters.” The Empress called Heine “Der Meister,” an adulatory exclamation that implies a position of enduring prominence in cultural memory. Her relationship to Heine extended far beyond a reverence for his works, as Elisabeth saw herself in a spiritualist exchange with Heine, who had died decades before in Paris.2 This literal re-presentation of Heine corresponds more closely with the Romantic version of memory, i.e., the melancholia and the experience of liminality. However, there are two forms of memory at play—the private personal memory of Elisabeth and the enduring public cultural memory she envisioned as solidified in a memorial. In her poem, “Aufruf” written to generate support for a memorial, Elisabeth envisions a marble likeness—an enduring image set in stone— as a fitting representation. She wrote in the last stanzas, Die Linden werden Ehrenwache halten, Umrauschend ihres Sängers Marmorbild; Zu seinen Füssen werden sich entfalten Die Rosen, deren Sehnen dann gestillt, Es wird nicht ihre Glut am Stein erkalten, Die rosig dankend seinen Fuß umhüllt; Doch eines ganzen Volkes Dank zu bringen Dies kann der Nachtigall allein gelingen. Und süßer noch soll ihre Stimme tönen Aus Lindenbäumen, Rosensträuchern jetzt. Ward doch erfüllt ihr träumerisches Sehnen, Dem Meister wird sein Standbild nun gesetzt, Dem Dichter all des Lieblichen und Schönen, Das heute noch des Menschen Herz ergötzt.— Es will die Nachwelt Ihm den Dank nun geben, Ihm, dessen goldne Lieder ewig leben. (291) The linden trees will honor guard, Marveling at their singer’s marble likeness; At its feet will unfold The roses, whose longing is stilled, Their smoldering embers stone will not cool, His foot thankfully they wrap; But to offer the gratitude of whole people This alone the nightingale can do. And its voice shall sound even sweeter From linden trees, rose bushes now.

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  217 Its dreamy longing fulfilled, The master’s image is now set, To the poet of everything lovely and beautiful, That still delights the heart of man.— Posterity now wants to thank him, Him, whose golden songs live eternally. (Translation mine) Elisabeth’s imitation of Heine’s poetic voice and symbolic language imbued the poem with a romantic poignancy that is strengthened by the break before the final two lines. The roses, linden trees, and longing all recall recurrent motifs from Heine’s poetry; the yearning that grows throughout the poem until the caesura two lines before the end recalls the form Heine frequently employed. The poem represents part of her efforts to substantiate Heine in the German cultural memory, as the gratitude in the last lines is attributed not merely from the lyrical subject to the “Meister” but from all of posterity to the author whose poetry lives eternally. While Elisabeth’s relationship to Heine and his poetry is both personal and public, the public nature of this poem, addressed as it is to “German hearts” and “German sisters,” aligns more so with the concept of collective memory. Indeed, the memorial is conceived as a public means to express gratitude, as the final lines indicate. Through her poetic and personal efforts, Elisabeth aimed to establish for Heine an enduring symbolic image that would situate him firmly in the landscape of German culture. In addition to lending her poetic talents to the campaign for the Heine memorial, Empress Elisabeth also donated half of the cost of the memorial and selected the sculptor Ernst Herter, the same sculptor who had fashioned a Heine statue for the Empress’ palace Achilleion on the island of Corfu (Hamann, Kaiserin wider Willen 478–80). Another important and well-known advocate for the Heine memorial in Düsseldorf was the German writer Paul Heyse who composed a short solicitation for donations that was printed in the “Düsseldorfer Anzeiger,” among others. Heyse began his appeal by invoking the “hochbegabte Geister, deren Tun und Streben sich aus dem rauschenden Getriebe ihrer Zeit erkennbar abhebt und noch wirkungsvoll in die Nachwelt hinübergreift” (qtd. in Schubert, “Der Kampf um das erste Heine-Denkmal,” 1990; “highly gifted spirits, whose actions and aspirations stand out clearly from the roaring machinery of their time and still impact posterity with their reach” [my translation]). Thus, Heyse placed Heine within the pantheon of writers and poets whose impact is felt long after their deaths, implying the stable memorialization that Assmann conceived as cultural memory. Displaying an acute awareness of Heine’s contentious reputation, Heyse attributed at least some of Heine’s unstated flaws to  the turbulent times and to Germany itself. Nevertheless, Heyse argued, Heine’s lyrical genius should afford him a place in the tradition

218  Bartell Berg of  great  German writers including Goethe and Walther von der Vogelweide. Other sections of Heyse’s appeal displayed an attempt to assuage conceivable German nationalist criticism, especially when Heyse asserted that the Rheinlanders needed decades after Heine to realize that their national and local interests were best served by acquiescence to Prussian rule. By placing Heine in the tradition of Goethe and Walther von der Vogelweide, Heyse proposed a literary immortality that a memorial would express in the form of a statue. In closing, Heyse noted that the committee has decided to work towards the completion of a Heine statue that would honor the memory of Heine, whom he called an immortal poet. This notion of statuary immortality reiterates the conception of the memorial as an enduring form of cultural memory. With Heyse’s appeal, the seeds of discontent both for and against the monument had been given a perfect growing medium. On the one hand, Heine, the poet whose writing had been banned in Prussia, would have rolled over in his Parisian grave at Heyse’s words. On the other hand, the German nationalists felt offended in their anti-Semitic and nationalist sensibilities at that comparison of the Jewish Heine with iconic figures of German literature, specifically Goethe. In the bitter fight that ensued, the mouthpieces of anti-Semitic populism vowed to block the building of the Heine monument. From anti-Semitic nationalist student fraternities to journalists such as Franz Sandvoß and notable anti-Semitic figures such as Georg von Schönerer, the opposition to the monument was fierce. Heine also had an important and powerful legion of supporters and admirers, such as Hermann Schütze, who wrote in Der Kunstwart, a prominent nineteenth-century journal that exerted a strong influence on opinion regarding literature and the arts and was widely read by educated bourgeoisie liberals in nineteenth-century Germany.3 Schütze wrote that he was “zu wenig Antisemit, um dem deutschen Dichter Heine seinen guten, seinen vortrefflichen Stil in Mißkredit bringen zu wollen” (Schütze 212; “not enough of an anti-Semite to discredit the German poet Heine’s excellent style” [my translation]). Perhaps most prescient is Schütze’s assertion, “daß sehr viel von der feindlichen Strömung, welche sich augenblicklich gegen den Dichter Heine richtet, vielmehr dem Juden Heine gilt” (212; “that much of the animosity, which is aimed at the poet Heine at the moment, is much more directed at the Jew Heine” [my translation]). Schütze’s defense of Heine addresses the core of anti-Semitic racial prejudice directed at Heine and his remembrance by those who wished to deny him a place in the literary and cultural memory of the German nation. Indeed, much of the opposition to the Heine memorial rested less in his acerbic satirical criticism of Germany or his French affinities and more in his Jewish heritage. Beyond the observation of antiSemitism inherent in many of Heine’s critics, Schütze also suggested that Heine’s

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  219 prosaischen Keulenschläge tausendmal mehr dazu beigetragen haben, die Deutschen von ihren alten auferzwungenen Erbherrlichkeits- und Sonderbundsideen abzubringen, als es etwa in der großen Zeit von 1870 und 71 irgend ein illustrer nationalliberaler Reichstagskandidat zuwege gebracht hätte. (212) prosaic blows have contributed a thousand times more to dissuade the Germans from their old imposed ideas of inheritance and Sonderbund than any illustrious candidate for a national liberal Reichstag would have achieved in the great period of 1870 and 71. (my translation) Like Heyse’s appeal, Schütze’s defense reversed the criticism that Heine had been unpatriotic or anti-German; Schütze effectively attributed to Heine’s acerbic criticism a patriotism that instead unified the country. Characterizing Heine as part of the vanguard of Germany’s position of power after the Franco-Prussian War, Schütze portrayed Heine as one of the best “Zertrümmerer und Aufbauer einer neuen Zeit” (212; “demolishers and builders of a new period” [my translation]) with or without a memorial. Schütze thus argued that Heine already occupied a secure place in German cultural memory; the memorial itself had, for Schütze, become somewhat superfluous, since Heine’s literary and cultural reputation earned him an important cultural cache as one of the more prominent builders of German culture. Unlike Heyse’s revision of Heine’s reputation, Schütze embraced Heine’s sharply penned literary works. He cautioned, Es haben sich ja Viele Mühe gegeben, aus Heines Schriften sorgsam die irgendwie patriotisch klingenden Stellen hervorzusuchen: “Denk’ ich an Deutschland in der Nacht, So bin ich um den Schlaf gebracht” u.s.w. Ja, wer solchermaßen ängstlich nach “patriotischen” Aus­ sprüchen in Heines Werken sucht, um seine Unschuld zu beweisen oder diejenigen gewisser Stellen, die sich gegen das Kotzebuesche Kleinstädter-Deutschland richten, der erweist meines Erachtens Heine einen schlechten Dienst. Mit solchen Tiraden, die ihm ja niemand zu glauben braucht, hat Heine seinem Vaterland viel weniger genützt als mit seinen Spottangriffen. Zu Heines Zeit lag keine Pflicht zum Preisen vor, sondern eine Pflicht zum Spott. Und dieser Pflicht hat Heine—das müssen auch seine Feinde bekennen—redlich genügt. (212) Many have made great effort to select carefully the somehow patriotic sounding passages from Heine’s writings: ‘Thinking of Germany in the night, I lie awake and sleep takes flight’ etc. Yes, anyone who

220  Bartell Berg is so anxiously looking for ‘patriotic’ sayings in Heine’s works to prove his innocence or certain places directed against the provincial Germany of Kotzebue, is doing Heine a disservice, in my opinion. Heine served his fatherland much less with such tirades, which no one needs to believe, than with his mockery. In Heine’s day there was no obligation to praise, but to mock. And Heine—his enemies must admit that—has certainly fulfilled this duty. (my translation) Schütze further described such attempts to reshape Heine’s reputation as dubious and as a disservice to the poet. Instead of evading Heine’s stark criticism of his native Germany, as Heyse had done, Schütze embraced his sarcastic mockery of German provincialism as the most impactful aspect of his writing. Thus, Schütze attempted to bolster Heine’s position in cultural currency not by obscuring his reputation but instead by embracing his status as an uneasy figure in German literary history. Despite efforts by advocates for the memorial, the anti-Semitic and nationalist rhetoric prevented a Heine memorial in Düsseldorf. By the time the German emperor Wilhelm II directly intervened in 1893 to cancel the Düsseldorf project, the committee that had originally initiated the discussion had lost its most prominent members. The mayor of Düsseldorf, Paul Heyse, and even the Austrian Empress had all resigned from the committee (Esterhammer 161). Beginning in Spring 1893/1894, representatives from the city of Mainz attempted to have a Heine monument placed in their city. By this time the task had been assigned to the sculptor, Ernst Herter, who conceived a “Loreley” fountain as a sculptural portrayal of Heine’s famous poem, metonymically to stand for all of Heine’s poetry. Like Heyse’s appeal, Herter’s Heine monument minimizes the author’s political nature. His artistic concept may have emphasized Heine’s literary stature, but this emphasis belies entirely the critical aspect of Heine’s writing wherein his biting social and political criticism espoused revolutionary and socialist perspectives. What is more, the whitewashing of Heine and his works by eliding those aspects most critical of the social, religious, and political regimes in Germany, did little to assuage the racially and politically motivated opponents. In order to garner more support for building it in Mainz, the journalist Hans R. Fischer wrote letters to important cultural figures and asked them to offer their opinions publicly regarding the construction of a monument to Heine. One surmises that Fischer thus aimed to shelter the new proposal from the fate of the earlier attempt in Düsseldorf. Literary and cultural figures lined up on both sides of the issue with supporters like Heyse and Ernst von Wildenbruch on the one hand and well-known detractors such as Berthold Auerbach, himself Jewish, on the other. Peter Rosegger, a then popular author, made a reply which stands out and

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  221 warrants attention, as it is illustrative of the cultural discourse at the time. In 1894, Rosegger wrote to Fischer the following: “Ich kenne weder Mainz noch Heine gut genug, um über die Sache eine bestimmte Meinung äußern zu können” (Rosegger 519; “I know neither Mainz nor Heine well enough to offer a particular opinion on the matter” [my translation]). Rosegger’s equivocal opinion did not go unnoticed; Fischer commented that Rosegger “ist nun über 50 Jahre alt geworden, ohne zu verraten, was für einen politischen und literarischen Standpunkt er einnehme. Freilich, Peterchen wurde oft darnach gefragt, antwortete jedoch stets so, daß ihn alle für sich reklamieren konnten” (Heinrich Heine: Im Lichte Unserer Zeit 31; “has now turned 50 without revealing what political and literary point of view he takes. Of course, Pete was often asked about it but always replied in such a way that everyone could claim him for himself” [my translation]). Rosegger’s evasive response failed to shield him from criticism. Responding to Rosegger’s pithy and perhaps evasive answer to Fischer’s query, an anonymous letter in the Berliner Börsen-Courier questioned a monthly stipend that the well-known and assumedly prosperous Rosegger was receiving from the Friedrich SchillerStiftung. While casting doubt on whether Rosegger deserved such support, the author expressed the following, damning criticism: “Ob Herr Rosegger liberal oder konservativ, antisemitisch oder philosemitisch, deutsch-national oder gut österreichisch gesinnt sei, fragt Niemand, denn Jeder war überzeugt, Herr Rosegger gehöre eben seiner Partei an” (qtd. in Wagner 254; “Whether or not Mr. Rosegger was liberal or conservative, anti-Semitic or philo-Semitic, German nationalist or Austrian-minded, no one asks, for each is convinced that Mr. Rosegger belonged to his party” [my translation]). Observers note that Rosegger seemed content to allow others to project political and literary views onto him instead of taking up the cause of liberalism. More importantly, for the readers of the Berliner Börsen-Courier and for Fischer, the question of support for or opposition to a Heine memorial was not merely a matter of taste. The Heine question was used as a shibboleth to determine the respondent’s political sympathies and cultural belonging. Rosegger’s prevarication and his ostensible ignorance regarding Heine placed him firmly outside the group of cultural influencers aligned with the liberal cause in nineteenthcentury Germany and Austria. While supporters and advocates for the Heine memorial sharply criticized Rosegger’s equivocation, the German nationalist and anti-Semitic criticism of Rosegger from the likes of the party of Georg von Schönerer was biting as well. In addition, Rosegger himself employed anti-Semitic elements in his literary and journalistic works. In the journal Der Heimgarten, which Rosegger also published, the author wrote the text “Der vernünftige Antisemitismus” (“Rational Anti-Semitism”) (1896), a title that causes the modern reader to recoil. Rosegger opined in the article,

222  Bartell Berg Die einen sagen: Das ist der Antisemitismus, welcher schon so viel Unheil gestiftet, das Volk verwirrt, die Deutschen gespalten hat; da thun wir nicht mit, obgleich wir selbst keine Judenfreunde sind. Die anderen erwidern: Die Verfasser des Programmes haben recht, der jüdische Einfluss soll bekämpft werden, Antisemitismus ist nothwendig, er ist das Kennzeichen einer guten deutschen Gesinnung. (942) Some say: This is anti-Semitism, which has already caused so much harm, which confuses the people and has divided the Germans; we do not join in, although we are not friends of the Jews ourselves. Others reply: the authors of this are right, the Jewish influence should be combated, anti-Semitism is necessary, it is the hallmark of a good German attitude. (my translation) Anti-Semitism, i.e., fighting against Jewish influence, Rosegger claimed, is the mark of a healthy German disposition. This would lead the reader to place Rosegger firmly in the camp of racist anti-Semites. However, Rosegger also rebuffed racist agitation in the same article when he claimed, “Einen Antisemitismus, der im Wesentlichen ein Kampf gegen die Korruption ist, lässt sich die Bevölkerung gerne gefallen; einen Antisemitismus aber, der als Rassenhetze auftritt, lehnen gerade unsere besseren Volkskreise ab” (942; “The population is happy to endure antiSemitism, which is essentially a fight against corruption; anti-Semitism, however, which appears as racial agitation, is precisely opposed by our better ethnic groups” [my translation]). From a twenty-first century perspective, Rosegger’s problematic anti-Semitism is clear. While his views may not be nearly as rabidly racist as the German nationalist parties, he is, most certainly, a child of his anti-Semitic cultural-historical paradigm. The expression of anti-Semitism became commonplace in late nineteenthcentury Vienna, where such feelings infected the political sphere as well. Testimony to the pervasiveness of such political sentiment was borne by the fact that an openly anti-Semitic candidate, Karl Lueger, was elected mayor of Vienna. The example above is also no isolated instance. In Rosegger’s journalistic work and his literary publications, one encounters many statements that belie his liberal leanings and evidence of prejudices that would have appealed strongly to readers of Blut und Boden literature and champions of reaction and racism. If Rosegger aimed to extract himself from the debate surrounding the Heine memorial by avoiding any particular stance pro or contra to a memorial in Mainz, his response to Fischer backfired. Rosegger became the object of mockery in liberal circles, as seen in the caricature entitled “Der Zank ums Heine-Denkmal” from the well-known satirical journal Der Wahre Jacob.4 While Heine looks on from Olympus in the heavens,

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  223 crowds are battling over the Loreley—a clear reference to Herter’s proposed memorial. The two figures fighting in the foreground hold boards of newspapers with the figure on the right displaying a slate of German and Austrian newspapers that include Jewish newspapers. Between these two unnamed figures in the foreground and the crowds in the background, two well-known authors, Peter Rosegger on the left and Ernst von Wildenbruch on the right, hold Gutachten (certificates of expert opinion). Rosegger’s Gutachten displays his position against the memorial, while Wildenbruch’s presents the arguments in favor of it. Heine floats above the tussle literally and figuratively. The woman accompanying Heine holds an unfurled scroll with Heine’s famous “Disputation” from the Romancero: Welcher Recht hat, weiß ich nicht, Doch es will mich schier bedünken, Daß der Rabbi und der Mönch, Daß sie alle beide stinken. (DHA 3/1, 172) I don't know which one is right— But I'll tell you what I think Of the rabbi and the friar: Both of them alike, they stink. (Draper 688) Altogether, the image renders Heine figuratively and literally above all the tumult surrounding the memorial. The quotation implies that Heine would sardonically ridicule those who would deny him a memorial for anti-Semitic or religious reasons. Heine’s cheerful, confident gaze and restful pose impart contentment with his position. This caricature is merely one of a host of articles, caricatures, and letters from German media of the time, as Dietmar Goltschnigg argues (55–74). With Rosegger’s feigned ignorance of Heine and the city of Mainz, the Styrian bard offended all and pleased none. Defending his fragile literary and political sensibilities, Rosegger responded in a journal article in Heimgarten titled “Nun kenne ich Heine gut genug” (1894). It is clear from the article that he was responding to criticism from all sides. Rosegger wrote, Doch genug. Das Ding hat auch eine ernste Seite. Nicht die Judenfrage als solche will ich berühren, in dieser Frage bin ich ja nie verstanden worden…. Hätte einer in diesem Fall nach Mainz geschrieben: “Dem Dichter Heine ein Denkmal!”—Entrüstung bei den Antisemiten. Hätte er geschrieben: “Dem Dichter Heine kein Denkmal!”—Wuthgeschrei im papierenen Lager Israels. … Also gleich das Geserres über den Ignoranten oder Opportunitätspolitiker. Hätte ich aber ganz geschwiegen, so

224  Bartell Berg würden sicher Stimmen der Empörung laut geworden sein darüber, dass sich ein stierisches Poetlein erdreistet, die hochwichtige HeineDenkmalfrage zu ignorieren…. Oppor­tunitätspolitik! Diese habe ich von jeher schlecht fundierten Blättern überlassen. Meine Politik, wenn man Selbsttreue so nennen könnte, ist sehr unpraktisch, anstatt Geld und Gut bringt sie Anfeindungen von allen Seiten. (519) But enough. The thing also has a serious side. I do not wish to touch the Jewish question as such, I have never been understood on this question … If one had written to Mainz in this case: “A monument to the poet Heine!”—outrage among the anti-Semites. If one had written: “No monument to the poet Heine!”—shouts of rage in the paper camp of Israel. … So, the same thing about the ignorant or the opportunistic politician. But if I had been completely silent, voices of indignation would surely have been heard that a Styrian poet dared to ignore the important Heine monument question … Opportunist politics! I have always left that to papers of lesser stature. My politics, if you could call it being true to oneself, is very impractical, instead of money and goods it brings hostility from all sides. (my translation) Defending himself from criticism from both sides, Rosegger lamented the purported misunderstanding of his position. Rosegger claimed that the “Jewish question” was not the basis for his evasiveness and took exception to accusations of opportunism regarding the Heine memorial. Rosegger’s protestations and unwillingness to take a clear stance in the matter, however, reveal an ambivalence and indicate a desire of ambivalent need to appeal to both parties among his readership. In order to understand Rosegger’s need to appease both anti-Semitic as well as liberal members of his readership, it is helpful to consider that Rosegger grew up as the son of poor peasant farmers and only made his way into literature after having worked as a tailor’s apprentice. His formal schooling was minimal and came at a late stage, and he depended upon the success of his publications for his livelihood (Wagner 7). Rosegger’s writing is therefore best understood within a cultural discourse and sociocultural climate that espoused anti-Semitic and anti-modernist views. Rosegger knew his readership, namely those whom Hermann Bahr classified as the middle-class on their way from the countryside into the city (Rossbacher 96). That Rosegger felt compelled to explain himself to this readership indicates that he understood the importance of appealing to their German nationalist tendencies while cloaking his anti-Semitism with a veil of untouched ignorance. Rosegger was not as innocent as his evasive answer had implied; before the question of the monument was raised, Rosegger had specifically mentioned the name of Heine in an earlier work

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  225 (Wagner 253). While feigning ignorance did not ultimately allow Rosegger to avoid the limelight of public criticism, it did allow him to avoid explicitly offending certain members of his readership. In an ironic twist, Rosegger’s equivocation in fact served to reinforce the memory of Heine for the readership of Heimgarten and other journals of the time. In forgetting Heine, Rosegger also illustrates how symbolic forms of collective memory function in reverse. By neither advocating for a memorial nor denying its appropriateness, Rosegger suggests that Heine did not already occupy a significant enough place in the collective cultural memory. However, this public act of feigned ignorance turned into a spectacle that accomplished exactly the opposite. His act of forgetting and the ensuing media spectacle accomplished a re-negotiation of Heine’s stature and a place in German cultural memory. If Rosegger’s readers were unaware of Heine and his literary works before the tumult involving the memorial, the justifications from Rosegger as well as the numerous caricatures, articles, and criticisms in the literary and journalistic media of the time served to strengthen the memory of Heine as a literary and historical figure. While knowledge of Heine does not necessarily entail understanding or appreciation for Heine’s works, the Heine affair and the media climate furthered impassioned discussions in the nineteenth-century press regarding Heine and his literary memory and his place in the broader cultural memory. If one considers the importance of monuments and memorials in legitimizing historical figures as symbols of cultural unity cohesion, the vociferous opposition to the Heine memorial on the part of the German nationalists is an attempt to shape a German cultural memory and identity that explicitly rejected Heine. In late nineteenth-century Germany, an era of burgeoning German nationalism, construction of a German national identity became an all-encompassing project that involved deliberate selection of cultural attributes, figures, and institutions that embodied German identity. As Kirsten Belgum observes, “Monuments are powerful messengers of collective identity. They embody a variety of political and social ideas, depending on the needs of a particular nation at a specific moment in history” (“Displaying the Nation” 473). Belgum theorizes that monuments, especially the massive monuments built in the late nineteenth century such as the Niederwalddenkmal, the Siegessäule in Berlin, and the Hermannsdenkmal, among others, contributed to a mobilization of the masses beyond the monuments’ physicality, especially through their depiction and dissemination in mass media. Like Benedict Anderson, who proposed that national identities are constructed in media, in culture, and in the minds of the mass readership through the consumption and experience of the same images and narratives (37–46), Belgum points to the consumption of narratives and images from nineteenth-century German media as important instruments in the construction of a German national identity. In a related manner, Ernest Gellner proposed that the growth of national

226  Bartell Berg identity in the nineteenth century could be traced through the development of cultural homogeneity (57). While Anderson and Gellner offer similar perspectives, Belgum’s contribution points to the commodification of the monuments through industrialized mass media as significant factors in building national unity. These massive monuments in late nineteenth-century Germany, as Belgum describes them, “were impressive and effective national spaces, but their impact on the national population was in part the product of another public commodity, the mass media” (474). While a small fraction of Germans visited the monuments firsthand, their depiction and presentation in the mass media reached a wide audience. The monuments and their reproduction in the media represent what Belgum describes as “the beginnings of the modern process of mediating national consciousness through mass communication” (459). The Heine memorial and the attending controversies presented in German media of the nineteenth century emerge, therefore, as part of the struggle to construct and curate national identity. By rejecting the building of a Heine memorial in Düsseldorf and then in Mainz, the German nationalists, political figures including Wilhelm II, and cultural figures like Peter Rosegger, attempted to influence the shaping of a national cultural identity. Building a memorial to Heinrich Heine, a contentious historical figure, would have undermined those efforts to mobilize the German population behind the building of a German nation state; the construction of a German cultural identity would have taken on a different contour. In 1893, members of the Arion Society, a German American singing club in New York, began to raise funds to bring the Heine Memorial to New York. In New York, too, the memorial was the subject of some controversy, however the debate mostly concerned the location of Ernst Herter’s Lorelei Fountain, which, as we have seen, was originally designed for the city of Mainz. The execution of the monument and its artistic value were deemed unworthy of the prominent location originally proposed for the Heine Memorial in New York. The New York Times described the monument at its unveiling as, disappointing. The naiads at the foot are graceful and finely conceived, but the chief figure does not convey to the American mind any conception of the Lorelei. The figure is chiseled in too heroic lines and would represent Brünhilde better than the Rhine maiden. Taken as a whole, however, the group is animated and inspiring. (“Heine Monument Unveiled” 11) Whereas the Heine affair in Düsseldorf and in Mainz revolved around anti-Semitic racism and German nationalism, criticism in New York of the memorial related to the perceived artistic mediocrity of Herter’s sculpture and less so to the author’s reputation and Jewish heritage.

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  227 Perceiving fin-de-siècle New York as a locus of multicultural understanding, Ernest Richard, the president of the monument committee that advocated for the building and placement of the Heine Memorial, declared at the unveiling of the memorial on July 8, 1899, The whole civilized world is celebrating with us, is protesting with us against the narrow spirit that refused a place to this fountain in the native city of the author by whose genius it was glorified, is expressing with us its admiration for the great singer, the master of style, the fearless soldier of liberty, is thanking him with us for many a tender, many an elevating emotion, many a pleasant hour, and, most of all, for the deeds he has done, for the wounds he has received in his lifelong fight for truth, for beauty, for liberty. (“Heine Monument Unveiled”) The comments are stinging and direct criticisms of the racist and nationalist elements of nineteenth-century German society. For Richard and his contemporaries in the German American community, especially in New York, the Heine Memorial invited the world to celebrate Heine’s poetic voice. While a Heine memorial may have undermined nationalist efforts in nineteenth-century Germany, the audience and participants at the unveiling of the Lorelei Fountain celebrated the cosmopolitanism of New York that supported the construction of a Heine memorial. If monuments serve as messengers that mobilize masses and contribute to a collective cultural identity, the Lorelei Fountain concretizes Heine’s memory in the German American community. Monuments to German cultural figures served as mnemonic institutions for German Americans and facilitated the construction and preservation of cultural identity and cultural memory. The impact of monuments in mobilizing massive crowds in the German American community is evident when one considers other notable monuments for German cultural figures constructed around the fin de siècle. At the dedication of the Friedrich Schiller monument in St. Louis in 1898, some 30,000 assembled for the ceremony (Lützeler et al. 76). The gathering for the unveiling of the Heine Memorial one year later in New York5 attracted between 4,000 and 6,000 people to the Lorelei Fountain and the parade that preceded it. Important German American figures like Carl Schurz attended the unveiling of the memorial, which was reported in the local and national press. The celebration of Heine in New York had a distinctly German American aspect. German American groups from the Turnvereine, the Arion Society, and various Liedervereine took part, and songs including “Das deutsche Lied” (otherwise known as “Das Lied der Deutschen,” the contemporary German national anthem) and “The Star-Spangled Banner” were sung. When a united choir of 2,000 voices sang “Die Lorelei,” the ceremonies reached their climax (“Heine Monument Unveiled”). In music, ceremony, and attendance, the

228  Bartell Berg unveiling functioned to unite the German American community around the celebration of Heine and the memorial to him. At the same time, the American flags and the conspicuous absence of German flags at the unveiling reveal an awareness that this event did not take place in Germany. Surrounding the Lorelei Fountain with American flags symbolized that Heine and his literary works were important mnemonic identity markers for the German American community in distinguishing itself from the nationalistic German culture at the time. The enduring and symbolic nature of the monument had an eminent place in the speeches at the unveiling. In describing the Lorelei Fountain, Randolph Guggenheimer, President of the New York Municipal Council, declared, It is a creation of art, which perpetuates not merely men’s remembrance of a great and original intellect that flashed upon the world as a meteor and passed again into darkness but will also save from death the name of the distinguished artist who conceived and executed this masterpiece of design and sculpture. (“Heine Monument Unveiled”) Guggenheimer’s expectation that the Heine Memorial would preserve the memory of both the poet Heine and the German sculptor of the Lorelei Fountain was, unfortunately, not fulfilled. The sculptor, Ernst Herter, did not gain particular recognition due to the memorial, and the memorial to Heine that inspired a contentious debate in the press draws little attention today at Joyce Kilmer Park in New York. This is, perhaps, a function of what Robert Musil observed, “that monuments are so conspicuously inconspicuous” (64). Musil surmises in his essay that this feature of monuments is largely due to the fact that such memorials, with some exceptions, become simply the backdrop for life instead of a call to remembrance and reflection. Whether due to the mediocrity of the artistic execution or the propensity of monuments to, as Musil explained, “de-notice” the public (65), the Heine Memorial in New York could not command the lasting recognition intended. Heine’s poetry, set to music by composers from Friedrich Silcher to Clara Schumann, remained more of an enduring phenomenon in the German American cultural memory due to its perennial appearance in musical venues throughout the world. The memorial, which may be read as a metonymic symbol for German American cultural identity, represents what Huyssen referred to as an urban palimpsest, in that it has been erased, renegotiated, and rewritten in the cultural memory of New York. Vandals damaged the Heine Memorial soon after its unveiling, and the fountain was eventually moved from its original location in 1940. After further significant damage from graffiti and bearing the scars of decades of neglect, the badly damaged Lorelei Fountain was restored in 1999 and relocated to a position of

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  229 prominence in Joyce Kilmer Park at the Grand Concourse. Jeffrey Sammons has noted the donations from German political and cultural figures and institutions such as the former German Federal President Johannes Rau, from the Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany, from the Goethe House, and others (338). The support of the German government and important members of German society for the restoration of the Heine Memorial certainly underscores the reassessment of and appreciation for Heine’s writing in twentieth-century Germany. As Randolph Guggenheimer’s address to the crowd at the unveiling of the Heine Memorial in 1899 showed, however, German Americans in nineteenth-century New York already understood the originality and quality of Heine’s literary voice. Here today we stand in the vanguard of the world’s progress, not as Germans or Frenchmen, not as Englishmen or Irishmen, but under the aegis and inspiration of a government that safeguards for us all the freedom of the press, the freedom of the intellect and liberty of conscience, we are simply members of the great human family who are not unmindful of the services rendered to humanity by the great departed thinkers of our race. (“Heine Monument Unveiled”) While Heine’s name and works are not commonplace in twenty-first century American culture, the presence of the Heine Memorial in New York and the persistence of advocates for the memorial and its restoration have reinforced Heine’s position in the literary canon and within German American culture. Guggenheimer expressed over a century ago that Heine’s works spoke to a greater humanity that reached beyond national borders (“Heine Monument Unveiled”). For New York, and for the world, Heine and the Lorelei Fountain stand as markers of what Huyssen referred to as the process of “cultural globalization.” The memory of Heinrich Heine as a leading voice for intellectual and literary freedom and modernity now overshadows the past voices of anti-Semitism and German nationalism that attempted to deny Heine’s position in German cultural memory, no doubt due to Germany’s national reckoning with its twentieth-century history. It is also worth mentioning that a plethora of Heine memorials now exist in Germany, which Maria Zimmermann and Dietrich Schubert have extensively researched. If monuments and other cultural institutions offer legitimacy and meaning to the past, present, and future, the attempts to deny Heinrich Heine a memorial in nineteenth-century Germany were aimed at undermining that signification. Guggenheimer’s assertion re-presented Heine firmly in the cultural memory of Americans, and especially German Americans, as a German Romantic and a great thinker whose place in the cultural memory could not be limited by geopolitical borders of nation

230  Bartell Berg states. As Gaston Bachelard’s assertion regarding the connection between space and collective memory illustrates, affording the Heine Memorial a space in New York granted the memory of the poet and of those who placed his memorial an enduring place in German American culture. Nonetheless, the Lorelei Fountain in Joyce Kilmer Park illustrates that cultural memory is not a mere fait accompli that results from the sedimented layers of historical events; the memorial’s placement, renovation, and re-placement all point to the continual processes of selection and renegotiation associated with cultural memory and its symbolic forms. Huyssen noted in Twilight Memories: Marking Time in a Culture of Amnesia, Human memory may well be an anthropological given, but closely tied as it is to the ways a culture constructs and lives its temporality, the forms memory will take are invariably contingent and subject to change. Memory and representation, then, figure as key concerns in this fin de siècle when the twilight settles around the memories of this century and their carriers. (2) While Huyssen here refers to the twilight of the twentieth century, similar can be said of memory at other periods, and especially in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. As the Heine Memorial shows, the historical shifts and the renegotiations of Heine’s place in German and German American cultural memory lay bare the contested construction of that memory. To be sure, this contested nature of cultural memory and the urban space as a palimpsest that is continually erased and rewritten while always retaining aspects of its former past fit within the contemporary moment with its debates involving memorials and monuments. Removing such monuments cannot reverse history or remove these figures from cultural memory; paradoxically, such a proposed erasure raises, if briefly, the profile of monuments and figures in the public consciousness. Removing such monuments may, however, allow us to de-construct our cultural memory and the discourse that mediates that memory. With a clearer understanding of this discourse, we may then begin to renegotiate these symbolic spaces and curate cultural memory anew.

Notes 1 For more on this topic see Theodor Gish. “‘Wanderlust’ and ‘Wanderlied’: The Motif of the Wandering Hero in German Romanticism,” Studies in Romanticism 3/4 (1964): 225–39. 2 For further detail, see Brigitte Hamann, Elisabeth: Kaiserin wider Willen. 11th ed. Munich, Amalthea, 1997, especially the chapter “Die Jüngerin Heines” (440–98).

Urban Palimpsests and Contentious Memorials  231 3 See Monika Dimpfl, “Die Zeitschriften Der Kunstwart, Freie Bühne / Neue Deutsche Rundschau und Blätter für die Kunst: Organisation literarischer Öffentlichkeit um 1900,” Zur Sozialgeschichte der deutschen Literatur: Einzelstudien, Teil II, ed. Monika Dimpfl and Georg Jäger (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1990), 117–97. 4 Otto Marcus, “Der Zank ums Heine-Denkmal,” Der Wahre Jacob, 24 Aug. 1895, can be viewed at https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/wj1895/0164/ image,info 5 A photograph by George Ehler Stonebridge, entitled “Crowds gathered around the Lorelei Fountain [Heinrich Heine Memorial] at its unveiling” is available on the website of the New-York Historical Society, Stonebridge Photograph Collection, and can be accessed at: http://107.21.244.134/ islandora/object/photosnycbeyond%3A41885.

Works Cited Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London and New York: Verso, 1983. Assmann, Jan. Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen. Munich: C.H. Beck, 1992. ———. “Communicative and Cultural Memory.” Cultural Memory Studies. An International and Interdisciplinary Handbook. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2008. 109–18. Bachelard, Gaston. The Poetics of Space. New York: Beacon, 1994. Belgum, Kirsten. “Displaying the Nation: A View of Nineteenth-Century Monuments Through a Popular Magazine.” Central European History 26.4 (1993): 457–74. Draper, Hal, trans. The Complete Poems of Heinrich Heine: A Modern English Version. Boston: Suhrkamp/Insel, 1982. Esterhammer, Ruth. Kraus über Heine: Mechanismen des literaturkritischen Diskurses im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2005. Fischer, Hans R. Heinrich Heine im Lichte unserer Zeit. Munich: E. Albert, 1894. Gellner, Ernest. Nations and Nationalism. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1983. Goltschnigg, Dietmar. “Bildkarikaturen zum Kampf ums Heinedenkmal.” Revista de Filología Alemana 15 (2007): 65–74. Grossman, Jeffrey. “Pictures of Travel: Heine in America.” German Culture in Nineteenth-Century America: Reception, Adaptation, Transformation. Ed. Lynne Tatlock and Matt Erlin. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2005. Halbwachs, Maurice. Les cadres sociaux de la Mémoire. Nouv. Éd. Paris: [no pub.], 1935. ———. La Memoire Collective. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1968. Hamann, Brigitte, and Empress Elisabeth. Das Poetische Tagebuch. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1997. 291. ———. Elisabeth: Kaiserin wider Willen. Munich: Piper. 1998. ———.“Testament.” Heinrich Heines Familienleben. Ed. Ludwig von Embden. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1892. 321. Heine, Heinrich. Historisch-kritische Gesamtausgabe der Werke. Düsseldorfer Heine Ausgabe (DHA). Ed. Manfred Windfuhr. 16 vols. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1973–1997.

232  Bartell Berg Huyssen, Andreas. Urban Palimpsests and the Politics of Memory. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2003. Lützeler, Paul Michael, et al. “The St. Louis World's Fair of 1904 as a site of cultural transfer: German and German-American participation.” German Culture in Nineteenth-Century America: Reception, Adaptation, Transformation. Ed. Lynne Tatlock and Matt Erlin. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2005. Nora, Pierre. “Between History and Memory: Les Lieux de Memoire.” Representations 26 (1989): 7–24. Nora, Pierre, and Lawrence D. Kritzman. Realms of Memory: Rethinking the French Past. 3 vols. New York: Columbia UP, 1998. Rosegger, Peter. “Nun kenne ich Heine gut genug.” Heimgarten 18 (1894): 519. ———.“Der vernünftige Antisemitismus.” Heimgarten 20 (1896): 942. Rossbacher, Karlheinz. Heimatkunstbewegung und Heimatkunst: Zu einer Literatursoziologie der Jahrhundertwende. Stuttgart: Klett, 1975. Sammons, Jeffrey L. “The Restoration of the Heine Monument in the Bronx.” Germanic Review 74.4 (1999): 337–39. Schubert, Dietrich. “Der Kampf um das erste Heine-Denkmal: Düsseldorf 18871893—Mainz 1893-1894—New York 1899.” Wallraf-Richartz-Jahrbuch 51 (1990a): 241–72. ———. “Heines Grab-Denkmal in Paris (1901): zur Situation seiner Memorierung um 1900.” Ruperto Carola 42(82) (1990b): 56–70. Schütze, Hermann. Letter. Der Kunstwart 1 (1887): 211–12. The New York Times, “Heine Monument Revealed.” The New York Times (9 Jul. 1899): 11. Wagner, Karl. Die literarische Öffentlichkeit der Provinzliteratur: Der Volksschriftsteller Peter Rosegger. Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1991. Zimmermann, Maria. Denkmalstudien, ein Beitrag zum Verständnis des Persönlichkeitsdenkmals in der BRD und in West-Berlin seit dem 2.Weltkrieg. Diss. Münster: Kunsthistorisches Institut, 1982.

10 No Mass or Kaddish The Forgotten Poet in Heinrich Heine’s Late Poetry Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo

The preoccupation with remembrance haunted Heinrich Heine’s exile in Montmartre. The Düsseldorf-born author’s late poems, particularly after his sickness rendered him immobile after 1848, evidence his complex pondering and unraveling of both the significance of his memories in his construction of self and how he would be remembered by contemporary and future readers in and outside of Jewish communities. Heine wrote from his deathbed haunted by his personal place—and displacement—in the pantheon of German poetry. How would he, born into a Jewish family in the French-occupied Duchy of Jülich-Berg, ostracized by Prussian academia despite his conversion to Protestantism in 1825, fit into German history and remembrance (Sammons 1979, 107)? What nation or identity would claim him, if any? In his late poem “Gedächtnißfeyer” (“The Anniversary” 1851), Heine asserts that no Mass would be sung or Kaddish uttered the day of his death.1 His late poetry, riddled with sardonic irony and caustic humor, foregrounds the issue of the poet being forgotten because he exists and writes at the margins of a prejudiced society. Heine imagined that his work could potentially be ignored, a fact that his poetic voice addresses angrily and politically. In this chapter, I analyze some of Heine’s exile poems of the last years of his life in Montmartre in the 1850s, using Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guttari’s framework of “minor literature,” in order to underscore the collective significance of Heine’s imaginings of his lonely death and oblivion.2 Heine stated that people demand their history “aus der Hand des Dichters und nicht aus der Hand des Historikers” (Heine 1961 vol. 3, 209; “from the hand of the poet and not from the hand of the historian” [my translation]). His late poetry demonstrates this fascination with the poet’s task of remembrance as he wrestled with the pains of his sickness. During his sickness, the fact of Heine’s impending death in exile became crucial to his poetic voice’s definition of selfhood. The personal memory of his life, as well as the preoccupation with how he would be remembered, are key themes of the last poetry collections of his life. Evelyne Ender explains that in the face of death, memory becomes particularly relevant because “our desire and need for remembrance express, in one DOI: 10.4324/9781003312239-14

234  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo breath, what is the predicament as well as the future of our human condition” (19). In other words, memory is necessary for the definition of selfhood, “since our ability to create a record of past experiences provides the foundations of human individuality” (Ender 3). Keen attention to the poet’s remembrance of his “Erlebnis” (“lived experience”), and his discussion of his own transcendence, sheds light on the unraveling of his personal identity and his place (and dis-placement) in the social settings he inhabited in Germany and France.3 Heine’s recollection of his life in these final poems is necessarily connected to his imagination of the legacy he would leave behind, as memory is the fundamental tool that enables one’s concept of self and the building blocks of the narrative of one’s life: “our thoughts, emotions, pleasures, and intentions only acquire an existential relevance when our remembrance casts them in a narrative pattern and creates a self” (3). Memory should be understood as both “autobiographical and historical record” (Richardson 277). The poet is both a “rememberer,” his poetry an archive of his own life and experience, and an “imaginer,” his work rich with speculation of how—and whether—his poetry and he would be remembered, insightfully foreshadowing that his poetry’s inclusion into literary canons would hinge on political circumstances. The process to recall memories and to imagine oneself (and one’s body of work) in different futures is not as distinct as one might suppose. Indeed, as Alan Richardson explains, memory and imagination are coalescent cognitive processes. The construction of possible futures (analogous to the work of creating fiction) draws from episodic memory: If its function were solely to recapture the personal past as reliably as possible, episodic memory would look flawed to say the least. But if memory serves equally to help one imagine possible futures, the seeming design flaws of episodic memory might instead prove to be adaptive advantages. Once we assume that a “crucial function of memory is to make information available for the simulation of future events,” then the provisional nature of episodic memory and its susceptibility to decomposition would serve to make its contents more readily available for creative recombination in the interests of “episodic future thinking.” (Schacter, Addis, and Buckner quoted in Richardson 279) Faced with impending death, Heine’s poems voice his intimately related cognitive processes of remembering his life and imagining his future commemoration, and, in his most hopeless poems, the possible lack of remembrance. Because of the enormous wealth of scholarship concerned with Heine’s reception, it is beyond the scope of the present essay to illustrate how Heine’s poetry has been included in—or rejected from—German and Jewish literary canons. Indeed, scholarship on Heine has already

No Mass or Kaddish  235 addressed questions of inclusion and rejection at length, with particular emphasis on his Jewish identity. Jeffrey Grossman asserts that despite a too-common claim that the “key to or essence of Heine’s work” lies in his Jewishness, this approach is misguided (251). Critics such as Robert Holub have asserted that the focus on Heine’s Jewish identity is “an invention of critics and literary scholars” (44), but that in fact, the “baptized author H. Heine was not a Jew and therefore not a German-Jewish writer … rather, he was a German writer of Jewish origin” (Sammons 1999, 9). In the same vein, in Grossman’s view, much scholarship on Heine states that the poet’s “response to Jewish culture was inauthentic or somehow detrimental to Jewish life” (251). The present chapter adds to this discussion by highlighting the poet’s own musings and his insights into how he expected to be remembered. This discussion of Heine’s belonging in different canons has been relevantly intersected by historical settings and within the particular political context of his critics. Jeffrey Sammons explains that before World War II, Heine’s “Jewishness tended to be underplayed, except by Jewish commentators, who sometimes wanted to enroll him or exemplify him for some Jewish point of view or other” (Sammons 1999, 8). As expected, the focus on his Jewish identity grew after the “post-World-War-II period” because of “the long and substantial history of anti-Semitic assault on him and his reputation” (Sammons 1999, 8). A salient example of the anti-Semitic effort to erase Heine from the German literary canon came from the National Socialist Party, which banned “Germany’s best-known folk song, ‘Lorelei,’ … because the words were written by a Jew, Heinrich Heine” (New York Times, 1938, no page number). Further, the streets of Berlin materially represent the shift that Sammons describes, as they have written, literally in stone, one of Heine’s most celebrated phrases at the Bebelplatz, the site of one of the Nazi book burning ceremonies of May 10, 1933. In an allusion to the lack of place of Heine’s work in the Nazi canon of the 1930s, the Bebelplatz plaque from the play Almansor (1821) reads, “Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher / Verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen” (DHA vol. 5, 16: 243; “That was only a prelude; where they burn books, they will in the end also burn people” [Winter 154–55]).4 In this phrase, Heine underscores the seamless progression from person-as-words to person-as-body: in other words, burning books eventually results in the burning of bodies because the existence of personhood exceeds the materiality of the body. This is especially true for a sick body such as Heine’s, who, according to Sammons’ Modern Biography, lived his last eight years confined to a “Matratzengruft” (“mattress tomb”) after his “conclusive physical collapse occurred in May 1848” (Sammons 1979, 295). To problematize the discussion of Heine’s inclusion into literary canons even further, Lothar Kahn and Donald D. Hook argue that Heine’s image in the pre-Hitler era was “even among Jewish writers … as much a bone of contention as he was among

236  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo German Christians” (54). Kahn and Hook contend that, “writers of the next generation, Gabriel Riesser and Berthold Auerbach, for example, who fought diligently for Jewish emancipation, feared that their efforts were endangered by Heine’s image, and they vigorously attacked him, though they were hardly apologetic” (53). Instead of offering a comprehensive look at Heine’s reception in the trenches of a battlefield of bellicose critics, I turn my attention to Heine’s own conceptualization of puzzling over memory. His poetry depicts, how he imagined his existence in words, the permanence and possible canonization of such words, and their inclusion into a national or trans-national canon. This chapter addresses how Heine used memory in his poetry in order to anchor “a sense of individual continuity over time,” even after his death (Ferguson 509). I would like to bring attention to the exclusion of two of Heine’s essays from this chapter that dive deeply into memory and which were published in the same year: “Die Götter im Exil” (“The Gods in Exile” Heine [1854a] 9, 215–67) and “Geständnisse” (“Confessions” Heine [1854b] 1, 3–322). The former ponders the displacement of Greek and Roman myth into the epistemology of Christian cultural dominion, an exile that Heine himself might have feared for his own works and person. In “Geständnisse,” the poet discusses his contempt of and contribution to Romantic poetry and evaluates his own person and work. In the essay, he paradoxically asserts, on the one hand, that “even with the most honest desire to be sincere, one cannot tell the truth about oneself” (2011, 520). And on the other hand, he recommends to the reader, “fear not that I shall paint myself too white and my fellow-beings too black. I shall always give my own colours with exact fidelity” (2011, 522). “Confessions” sheds much light onto the ponderings of the poet, but it is not a primary text herein because I wish to focus on his poetry, and “Geständnisse” is written in prose.5 Instead, my focus will be on several poems about memory in the collections Romanzero (Romancero 1851) and Gedichte: 1853 und 1854 (Poems of 1853 and 1854). Given the position “on the fringe” that Heine’s work has occupied at some moments of its historic reception, as well as its tension between the intimate and collective aptitude of its utterance, Deleuze’s and Guattari’s Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature proves relevant in the reading of his work. Deleuze and Guattari offer “Jewish literature of Warsaw and Prague” as an example of minor literature, defined not as one that comes “from a minor language” but rather “that which a minority constructs within a major language” (16). Much like Kafka, Heine produced a body of work that “is affected with a high coefficient of deterritorialization” (16). In Heine’s case, the deterritorialization is twofold, as he was a minority writer in Germany and an exile in France. Like Kafka’s writing, Heine’s work is necessarily political, as evidenced by the conflicting receptions cited above. Minor literature’s “cramped space forces each

No Mass or Kaddish  237 individual intrigue to connect immediately to politics. The individual concern thus becomes all the more necessary, indispensable, magnified, because a whole other story is vibrating within it” (17). Heine’s image could only be such a bone of contention among German-Jewish writers as well as German Christians in the 1920s and 30s because of the “political domain [having] contaminated every statement” (17). That is, because the decisions either to commemorate Heine’s work, or to burn it publicly, result from political motivations. Deleuze and Guattari argue that there is a scarcity of talent in minor literatures, a point that certainly could be contested. Even though Deleuze and Guattari do not mention Heine directly in this sense, one considers the vast number of writers influenced by Heine and who identified with him and his experiences.6 However, Toward a Minor Literature is useful in that it enables a deeper understanding of how Heine’s poetry welcomes contrasting readings and sparks vehement debates: Literature finds itself positively charged with the role and function of collective, and even revolutionary, enunciation. It is literature that produces an active solidarity in spite of skepticism; and if the writer is in the margins or completely outside his or her fragile community, this situation allows the writer all the more the possibility to express another possible community and to forge the means for another consciousness and another sensibility … the literary machine thus becomes the relay for a revolutionary machine-to-come not all for ideological reasons but because the literary machine alone is determined to fill the conditions of a collective enunciation that is lacking elsewhere in this milieu: literature is the people’s concern. (17–18) Heine was a minority author and his poetic voice has often been read as representative of collective utterances. In asking whether and to what extent he would be remembered and pondering his place in literary tradition and the puzzle of national identity, Heine implied the question of what the body politic ought to look like.7 The issue of the representation of the nation as a body is intimately related to the process of collective memory, since we can expect foreign limbs—to continue the metaphor of the nation as body—which do not fit into the body politic, to disappear from portraits of the past, unless they are actively remembered for political reasons. In having his words burned and—decades later—set in stone upon Bebelplatz, one of the most visited squares of the city where he once studied, Heine successfully cemented his personhood-in-letters into both the physical and metaphorical body of Germany. We can read Heine in the theoretical framework of minor literature because he wrote while in exile, “outside his or her fragile community,” where his personhood-in-letters did not match the immediate setting

238  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo and instead was soaked in nostalgia (Deleuze and Guattari 17). In the second poem I analyze below, “Jetzt wohin?” (“Whither Now?” 1851), the desire to return in person is palpable. And beyond the physical return, the poetry of Heine shows a desire to return-in-words; that is, for his work to transcend in the collective memory of German literature. Heine had a complex relationship with fame, contemplating whether the immortalization of his self-in-letters was worth the pain of exile, and, as evidenced in poems such as “Weltlauf” (“The Way of the World” 1851) and “Erinnerung aus Krähwinkels Schreckenstagen” (“Recollections from Krähwinkel’s Days of Terror” 1854), what the place of marginalized Jewish people was in the German body politic. Heine’s preoccupation with his own star in the constellation of poetry was also a question of identity, of his place among disenfranchised people in the physical world. Turning to the world of his poetry, the 1851 collection Romanzero is divided into three parts: Historien (Histories or Tales), Lamentationen (Lamentations), and Hebräische Melodien (Hebrew Melodies). The Romanzero has received much attention from scholars because of its sharp wit and ironic humor.8 I have selected the poems that most strikingly address public memory and collective commemoration in the second and third parts.9 The discrimination and violence that dominate the history of the epochs and places that Heine inhabited find their way into his work, particularly in the second part. Within the book of Lamentations appears a series of “Lazarus” poems, which address themes including “unjust suffering, pending death, lost hope for his life, and a retrospective assessment of those Romantic dreams that had underpinned his sense of the value of life” (Cook 121). Much like the biblical figure’s voice, the voice of Lazarus in Heine’s poems speaks from a grave. But, as Roger Cook argues, Heine “does not employ this voice from the tomb to rail disconsolately at the injustices of the world. Rather he employs the grave as an innovative standpoint that opens up new vistas on important questions of human existence” (121). Despite the grim tone of the series, it is full of instances of hope, of intimacy, and a tension between commemoration and silence that is not entirely resolved on either side. Within the Lazarus series, we find the poem “Gedächtnißfeyer” (“The Anniversary”) (1851). It opens with an unusual silence. In both Christian and Jewish traditions, death is followed by words: Mass and song. Heine subverts this expectation as he writes: Keine Messe wird man singen, Keinen Kadosch wird man sagen, Nichts gesagt und nichts gesungen Wird an meinen Sterbetagen. (DHA vol. 3/1, 114)

No Mass or Kaddish  239 Not one mass will e’er be chanted, Not one Hebrew prayer be mutter’d, When the day I died returneth,— Nothing will be sung or utter’d.10 (Bowring 459) The poetic voice opens the poem with the absence of rite and song, the silence of both Heine’s origin and German Christians, unencumbered by his death. It is a subversion of Judeo-Christian societal conventions to remain quiet, as both religions normally gather families and larger communities to mourn collectively in novenas and Shivas, where loss is discussed, and the comfort of others can be accepted. Further, the poetic voice subverts the expectation that the act of poetry is to utter. Poetry and the spoken word are as traditionally linked as death and mourning. To open the poem with the depiction of silence is as subversive as the lack of religious rite, an indication of the pain of a forgotten poet, whose poetry is not read. These first lines are written in the passive voice, eliminating a possible subject of utterance by grammatical means. The result is collective stillness. If rite can be thought of as the beginning of the cementation for collective memory, and the act of speech is not performed initially after death, then the poet ironically implies that there is no possibility for eventual commemoration. The absence of rite contains in itself the dearth of memory. The poem, as the first archiver of his emotions and lived experiences, reflects on the possible lack of place for his self in the German social body and his erasure from history. The next stanza shifts the tone and introduces two characters. Collective silence is still present, but the mundane and intimate make their appearances. Doch vielleicht an solchem Tage, Wenn das Wetter schön und milde, Geht spazieren auf Montmartre Mit Paulinen Frau Mathilde. (DHA vol. 3/1, 114) Yet upon that day, it may be, If the weather has not chill’d her, On a visit to Montmartre With Pauline will go Matilda. (Bowring 459) Heine’s wife Mathilde and her companion Pauline “vielleicht” (“maybe”) appear one day on the scene of Montmartre, the cemetery where Heine would eventually be buried. The poetic voice’s person-body remains in exile after his death and, in the absence of rite and collective mourning, it

240  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo suggests that his body of work will be buried in exile too.11 The adverb “vielleicht” might otherwise be easily dismissed, but here it is of vital importance to the stanza because it implies that it is not even a certainty that Heine’s own wife Mathilde will remember to commemorate his life, an example of Heine’s dark and ironic humor. Mathilde carries the responsibility of memorializing the poet’s body because the poetic voice ironically states that no one else will. But it is far from certain that even she will bring flowers to his grave. The next stanza depicts Mathilde with a wreath of “immortelles,” or Helichrysum bracteatum, a flower whose distinct name first introduces remembrance into the poem.12 Mit dem Kranz von Immortellen Kommt sie, mir das Grab zu schmücken, Und sie seufzet: Pauvre homme! Feuchte Wehmut in den Blicken. (DHA vol. 3/1, 114) With a wreath of immortelles she’ll Deck my grave in foreign fashion, Sighing say “pauvre homme!” and sadly Drop a tear of fond compassion. (Bowring 459) The first utterance made by a character in the poem comes from his spouse, perhaps the most intimate relationship one can have, and it is notably not in German, but in French. The words express pity, perhaps a self-pity in which the poetic voice remembers the pain of the “mattress tomb.” The utterance is individual and, because it is in French, it is disconnected from the national origin of the poet. The following stanza features another utterance, where now the poetic voice addresses Mathilde: Leider wohn’ ich viel zu hoch, Und ich habe meiner Süßen Keinen Stuhl hier anzubieten; Ach! sie schwankt mit müden Füßen. (DHA vol. 3/1, 114) I shall then too high be dwelling, And, alas! no chair have ready For my darling’s use to offer, As she walks with foot unsteady. (Bowring 459) The poetic voice, presumably a representation of the poet himself, has observed the scene from above. The place above, heaven perhaps, seems

No Mass or Kaddish  241 a different and much higher place than where Heine was when he lived; as though he were above it all now, in his death. In the last stanza, the poetic voice is again concerned with the buried body, which is no longer his own. It now suggests to Mathilde to look after her weary feet and take a cab home: Süßes, dickes Kind, du darfst Nicht zu Fuß nach Hause gehen; An dem Barrière-Gitter Siehst du die Fiaker stehen. (DHA vol. 3/1, 114) Sweet, stout little one, return not Home on foot, I must implore thee; At the barrier gate is standing A fiacre all ready for thee. (Bowring 459) The poem goes from a general subject-less silence to an intimate conversation between husband and an imagined future wife, based on a present unreliable person who, Heine already knows, cannot be trusted to bring flowers to his grave regularly. This image of his wife in the future is based on his present experience and memories of her, since episodic memory and imagination of future settings are so intimately related. The poem starts in the grave and shoots up, to a place high above the politics of collective commemoration. The concern with silence and absence of rite could be erased by that line, but is not erased conclusively, leaving the problem of collective memory unresolved, as if Heine had known that his inclusion in literary canons would command tension throughout the centuries. Heine soaked the Lamentationen in humor, addressing topics such as hangovers, laughable bodies in his context, and the mundane obligations of the poet to keep the peace at home by writing love notes to Mathilde, which at times imply that love notes are a chore. It comes as no surprise that poems of painful displacement also feature this dark humorous tone, and such is the case of “Jetzt wohin?” (“Whither Now?”). The poem opens with the titular question and the image of metaphorically dismembered and stupid feet, a metonymy representing the painful desire of return and ensuing contrast with the negative of reason: Jetzt wohin? Der dumme Fuß Will mich gern nach Deutschland tragen; Doch es schüttelt klug das Haupt Mein Verstand und scheint zu sagen:

242  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo Zwar beendigt ist der Krieg, Doch die Kriegsgerichte blieben, Und es heißt, du habest einst Viel Erschießliches geschrieben. (DHA vol. 3/1, 101) Whither now? my stupid foot Fain to Germany would guide me; But my reason shakes its head Wisely, seeming thus to chide me: Ended is the war indeed, “But they still keep up courts-martial, And to writing things esteem’d Shootable, thou’rt far too partial. (Bowring 450) The poetic voice’s foot knows what it wants, to return, but the poet has written such poems that, if he were to return, he would be killed. Consistently with the overarching motif of personhood transcending the body and also existing materially in words, it is not the poet’s body that is “erschießlich,” or fit for a bullet, but that which is written. The personbody and person-word meld together: both in body and mind the return to Germany is rendered impossible, but the “dumb” desire stubbornly persists. “Heimweh,” or homesickness, is thus a nuisance of memory that endangers the life of the rememberer-in-exile. Moreover, the many wars that afflicted Germany appear represented in the verses. Mostly fought over autonomy from foreign powers, the clashing forces of unification and independence, and between middle-class liberal ideals versus autocratic political structures, the Hundred Days War of 1815 and the more recent German Revolutions of 1848–49 destabilized regional identity and effectively made Heine’s personal position precarious and indeed dangerous. The poetic voice then admits no aspiration to heroism, a stance that further complicates Heine’s commemoration and voice in the collective. In minor literature, there is an implied heroism in the collective utterance as it voices the disenfranchised. The poetic voice subverts such an expectation as he says: Das ist wahr, unangenehm Wär’ mir das Erschossenwerden; Bin kein Held, es fehlen mir Die pathetischen Gebärden. (DHA vol. 3/1, 102) That’s quite true, and being shot Has for me no great attractions;

No Mass or Kaddish  243 I’m no hero, and unskill’d In pathetic words and actions. (Bowring 450) It is with humor that the poetic voice describes getting shot as merely unpleasant or unsavory, keeping with the witty tone of the second section of the Romanzero. Others, such as Sammons, have noted before the caustic nature of Heine’s wit and Sigmund Freud read humor as a form of coping with tension and unresolved emotional turmoil (89). In this poem in particular, the tension arises from the contradictory and simultaneous desires to stay away and return. The tension remains unresolved, but the humor brings it to the foreground and enables both the poetic voice and reader to recognize the tension that exists. In Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten (Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious) (1905) Freud illustrates how Heine uses wit to process the paradigms of his family relations and his experience of rejection by wealthy relatives. It is hence not out of the question to assert that the poet would employ similar mechanisms to process the experience of exile. Freud attests that Heine found a way to rehearse the rejection of his family in the creation of a “comic person” by the name of “HirschHyacinth” a “Kollekteur, Operateur und Taxator aus Hamburg” (Freud 89; “collector, operator and tax appraiser from Hamburg” [Brill 5]).13 Initially, Freud does identify that this character’s sense of humor must bring the poet great pleasure, as the poet puts in his character’s mouth, “Die amüsantesten und freimütigsten Äußerungen” (Freud 89; “the most amusing and most candid utterances” [Brill 5]). In Freud’s view, Heine’s character has the practical wisdom of a Sancho Panza, the quixotic epitome of humor (5). The importance of stating Hirsch-Hyacinth’s wit becomes apparent when Freud suggests that the poet’s voice could be hiding behind the mask of his character: “Als spräche aus HirschHyacinth der Dichter selbst hinter einer dünnen Maske” (89; “As if the poet is speaking behind the transparent mask of Hirsch-Hyacinth” [5]). Freud argues that in a similar way to the poet, who migrated from the name Henry to Heinrich by means of baptism, Hirsch becomes Hyacinth. In Freud’s view, poet and character become one. And the reason to write himself into character lies, for Freud, in the poet’s personal history: Nun muß jeder, dem des Dichters Lebensgeschichte bekannt ist, sich erinnern, daß Heine in Hamburg, wohin auch die Person des HirschHyacinth weist, einen Onkel des gleichen Namens besaß, der als der reiche Mann in der Familie die größte Rolle in seinem Leben spielte. Der Onkel hieß auch—Salomon, ganz wie der alte Rothschild, der den armen Hirsch so “famillionär” aufgenommen. Was im Munde des HirschHyacinth ein bloßer Scherz schien, zeigt bald einen Hintergrund ernsthafter Bitterkeit, wenn wir es dem Neffen Harry-Heinrich zuschieben. Er gehörte doch zur Familie, ja wir wissen, es war sein heißer Wunsch,

244  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo eine Tochter dieses Onkels zu heiraten, aber die Cousine wies ihn ab, und der Onkel behandelte ihn immer etwas “famillionär”, als armen Verwandten. Die reichen Vettern in Hamburg nahmen ihn nie als voll. (Freud 89–90) Everyone acquainted with the life of the poet will recall that in Hamburg, where one also meets the personage Hirsch-Hyacinth, Heine had an uncle of the same name, who played the greatest role in Heine’s life as the wealthy member of the family. The uncle’s name was likewise Solomon, just like the elderly Rothschild who treated the impecunious Hirsch on such a famillionaire basis. What seems to be merely a jest in the mouth of Hirsch-Hyacinth soon reveals a background of earnest bitterness when we attribute it to the nephew Harry-Heinrich. For he belonged to the family, nay, more, it was his earnest wish to marry a daughter of this uncle, but she refused him, and his uncle always treated him on a somewhat famillionaire basis, as a poor relative. His rich relatives in Hamburg always dealt with him condescendingly. (Brill 5) In creating the Hyacinth character and imbuing him with his own witty, ironic voice, the poet remembered and fictionalized a painful family relationship. The poem “Jetzt wohin?” achieves something similar, as it uses the wit of the poet’s own voice, through the transparent mask of the poetic voice, to process the agony of his slow death. And because his body is deterritorialized, the wit is as well a collective utterance, depicting a painful experience that is not only his own, but one which many other minority poets, readers, and especially those in exile, can identify with. The poetic voice then enumerates several possible locations in which he might live. Keeping with the tone, he wittily describes the advantages and flaws of England, the United States, and Russia, striking a humorous tension between appealing features of these places, weighing them against uncomfortable or antiquated disadvantages that could affect one’s body. He first addresses aspects of England: Gern würd’ ich nach England geh’n, Wären dort nicht Kohlendämpfe Und Engländer—schon ihr Duft Gibt Erbrechen mir und Krämpfe. (102) Fain to England would I go, View’d I not with such displeasure Englishmen and coals—their smell Makes me sick beyond all measure. (Bowring 450)

No Mass or Kaddish  245 The reasons to stay away from England are driven by bodily comfort. They are expressed with light—albeit offensive—humor. As expected, he has similar objections to the United States, although the advantage is an unprecedented equality: Manchmal kommt mir in den Sinn, Nach Amerika zu segeln, Nach dem großen Freiheitstall, bewohnt von Gleichheits-Flegeln— Doch es ängstet mich ein Land, Wo die Menschen Tabak käuen, Wo sie ohne König kegeln, Wo sie ohne Spucknapf speyen. (102) To America methinks I would sail the broad seas over; To that place of freedom where All alike may live in clover, Did I not detest a land Where tobacco’s ’mongst their victuals, Where they never use spittoons, And so strangely play at skittles. (Bowring 450–51) Freedom and equality are connected here, and made almost synonymous, as they would erase the need for exile.14 However, the word Gleichheitsflegeln is an intentional insult. The implication is clear, that despite its supposed freedom and equality, the United States is a young and unrefined nation. The lack of a king, and therefore the figure of an ancient aristocratic hierarchical structure, based necessarily on blood relations, becomes synonymous with a lack of elegance. Thus, this kingless society has a tension, necessary for the comedic tone, between freedom and coarseness. The poetic voice again rejects the possibility of this country, lamenting his physical aversion, as he depicts the twin images of tobacco chewing and spitting without a spittoon. The speaker also considers Russia as a possibility, but the physical discomfort would be too great, due to the weather: Rußland, dieses schöne Reich, Würde mir vielleicht behagen, Doch im Winter könnte ich Dort die Knute nicht ertragen. (102)

246  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo Russia, that vast empire fair, Might be tolerably pleasant, But I should not like the knout That’s their usual winter present. (Bowring 451) Having no tether to the world, the poetic voice looks up from the map and onto the stars. Here, the existence of the self is no longer confined to the body. The self metaphorically tries to become a star, stars being memories themselves, since their light existed millions of years ago, only now reaching Earth. But the poetic voice tries, and fails, to find itself in the night sky, as though Heine suspects his light will not shine on after his death: Traurig schau ich in die Höh’, Wo viel tausend Sterne nicken— Aber meinen eignen Stern Kann ich nirgens dort erblicken. (102) Sadly gaze I up on high, Where the countless stars are gleaming, But I nowhere can discern Where my own bright star is beaming. (Bowring 451) The tension of humor is diffused and replaced with the reality of pain. The poetic voice has mocked the physical discomforts of several nations, but the reality is that the poet cannot go anywhere. There is not even a place for him in the vastness of space, also an implication that there is no place in the constellation of the German—and universal—literary canons. Given that it is a collective utterance, insofar as it is an instance of minor literature, the unanswered question at the beginning of the poem “whither now?” is necessarily political, an excruciating question for the Jewish diaspora. The last stanza depicts him being lost, confused in the heavens, but eventually returning to the body, depicting it in turmoil, as lost as the star itself: Hat im güldnen Labyrinth Sich vielleicht verirrt am Himmel, Wie ich selber mich verirrt In dem irdischen Getümmel. (102) Perhaps in heaven’s gold labyrinth It has got benighted lately,

No Mass or Kaddish  247 As I on this bustling earth Have myself been wandering greatly. (Bowring 451) Turning our attention back to the Lazarus cycle of the Lamentationen book, we encounter again the comedic tone and implications for the personal history of the poet, as well as the collective experience of the Jewish diaspora in Germany. In addition to the twelfth poem in the series “Gedächtnißfeyer,” the themes are set forth in the first poem of the series, “Weltlauf.” Hat man viel, so wird man bald Noch viel mehr dazubekommen. Wer nur wenig hat, dem wird Auch das wenige genommen. Wenn du aber gar nichts hast, Ach, so lasse dich begraben— Denn ein Recht zum Leben, Lump, Haben nur, die etwas haben. (105) He who has already much, Finds his wealth increasing faster; Who but little, is of all Soon bereft by some disaster. But if thou hast nothing, friend, Go and hang thyself this minute; Only they who’ve aught on earth Have a claim for living in it. (Bowring 453) The Lazarus cycle opens with a terribly pessimistic statement that places disenfranchised people at the thematic core. But keeping with the tone of the collection, one must assume it is ironic. The poetic voice does not in earnest think the right to live is contingent on private property. Indeed, irony relies upon both speaker and audience remembering what is actually true, so that the readers are aware that what the poetic voice says is opposite of what is stated. The poetic voice then insults the poor only to ridicule the voices of oppressors and, by subverting them, it mocks the idea that the right to live belongs only to the wealthy. There is no definitive reference to which disenfranchised group the poetic voice is referring to, making it difficult to assert whether he is talking about the identities that he bears. However, as evidenced by the previous poems, it is not

248  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo foolish to assume a certain degree of self-representation. Therefore, the ironic contempt against the very existence of people with nothing (that the poem mocks) could refer not only to the lack of material wealth, but also to the lack of nationhood. The tone and theme of the poem recalls Swift’s ironic A Modest Proposal (1729), in which the narrative voice suggests in order to prevent the children of the poor people of Ireland from being burdensome to society, and particularly to British rule, they should be eaten. Much like Swift, Heine speaks from a place of marginality, using an ironic tone to resist the cruel devaluation of people’s lives. The collective and particularly the political dimensions of both texts therefore become undeniably apparent. In addition to the very useful creation of tension that the previous poems have displayed, humor and irony are here tools to champion communities so marginalized that the legitimacy of their right to exist could come into question. As grimly foreshadowed by the poets, Irish children were denied the right of existence during the Great Famines of the mid-nineteenth century, and Jewish people during the Holocaust a century later. As evidenced by the citation above from Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious, Freud argues that the wealth of Heine’s condescending relatives and his subsequent experience of rejection were a leitmotif. The implied contempt the poetic voice expresses for wealth could be additionally intersected by the poet’s personal life, furthering the tension between personal memory and collective commemoration. As much as the minor literature framework stimulates a reading of the poem in which the destitute character functions as a synecdoche for marginalized groups, a reading of this character as a metaphor for the poet himself is consistent with the personal tone of the book of Lamentationen. These readings can exist in tension, as different types of marginalization intersect the poetic voice, familiar, national, and universal—as evidenced by “Jetzt Wohin?” The final collection of Heine’s poems, Gedichte 1853 und 1854, presents the poet’s rich memories of the past in the harsh, joyless light of his approaching death. The collection as a whole has a darker tone when compared to the sometimes lively Romanzero, with its sparks of hope. The personal setting and extraordinary physical pain of the poet soaks these lines in grief. The themes of silence, oppression, and remembrance are at the forefront. Given their concurrence, the Romanzero and Gedichte are often linked thematically; the latter are even seen as a continuation of the former.15 However, the Gedichte poems are morose, as apparent in the xenophobia and subsequent silence represented in the twentieth poem of the series, “Erinnerung aus Krähwinkels Schreckenstagen,” (“Recollections from Krähwinkel’s Days of Terror” 1854, DHA 3/1, 227–28). In this narrative poem, the voice recalls a day of terror that happens in a place so vague, it could be anywhere, reminding readers of Heine’s deterritorialization.

No Mass or Kaddish  249 Wir, Bürgermeister und Senat, Wir haben folgendes Mandat Stadtväterlichst an alle Klassen Der treuen Bürgerschaft erlassen. Ausländer, Fremde, sind es meist, Die unter uns gesät den Geist Der Rebellion. Dergleichen Sünder, Gottlob! sind selten Landeskinder. Auch Gottesleugner sind es meist; Wer sich von seinem Gotte reißt, Wird endlich auch abtrünnig werden Von seinen irdischen Behörden. (227) We, mayor and senate of the town, The following orders now lay down To all who love their city truly, Enjoining them to keep them duly. ’Tis foreigners and strangers most Who their rebellious spirit boast; Thank God, such rogues (to put it fairly) The children of the soil are rarely. The Atheists likewise are concern’d; For he by whom his God is spurn’d Is sure at last to hold detested All those on earth with power invested. (Bowring 537) The poem opens with situated speech. The poetic voice matches with the character-speaker, a man of political power accustomed to being heard. His speech is clearly inflammatory, blaming all social ills on various classes of marginalized people, in particular foreigners, strangers, and atheists. That is, people who do not fit into a restrictive body politic but who live among the people who do. We might infer that Heine is making a mockery of the mayor’s speech. However, there is no indication of such a mockery within the poem. As opposed to the Romanzero, this poetic voice does not exhibit the earlier irony and defiance. Instead, the mayor’s voice states without hesitation or challenge, “obey authority:” Der Obrigkeit gehorchen, ist Die erste Pflicht für Jud’ und Christ.

250  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo Es schließe jeder seine Bude, Sobald es dunkelt, Christ und Jude. Wo ihrer drei beisammenstehn, Da soll man auseinandergehn. Des Nachts soll niemand auf den Gassen Sich ohne Leuchte sehen lassen. Es liefre seine Waffen aus Ein jeder in dem Gildenhaus; Auch Munition von jeder Sorte Wird deponiert am selben Orte. (227–28) Christian and Jew, at close of day, Must shut their shops without delay; “Obey your rulers” should be ever Both Jew and Christian’s first endeavour. No person shall be seen at night In any street without a light; Where three or more in groups are standing, Let them at once begin disbanding. Each one must bring his weapons all, And lay them down in the guildhall; And every kind of ammunition Is subject to the same condition. (Bowring 537) Even though the first few lines of the poem assert that the speech herein is addressed to all people, despite differences in class, the message is clearly targeted at foreigners, strangers, and atheists. The major insists that it is the other within an otherwise homogenous body politic that causes all evils, and it is therefore implied that weapons would be stripped from them, that it is only they that cannot gather on the alleyways in the dark. As a symbol of self-determination, power in the form of weaponry is removed. At the end, the voice of authority, constructed as a male in its military quality, seems to appeal once again to the community at large, as he threatens any form of dissent with death and instead recommends silence: Wer auf der Straße räsoniert, Wird unverzüglich füsiliert; Das Räsonieren durch Gebärden Soll gleichfalls hart bestrafet werden.

No Mass or Kaddish  251 Vertrauet eurem Magistrat, Der fromm und liebend schützt den Staat Durch huldreich hochwohlweises Walten; Euch ziemt es, stets das Maul zu halten. (228) He who in any public spot Ventures to reason, shall be shot; He who by gestures dares to reason Shall pay the penalty of treason. Confide in the authorities, So gracious, but withal so wise, Who rule the fortunes of the city, And hold your tongues, or more’s the pity. (537) Silence had indeed been the opening image of previous poems. However, the possibilities for remembrance and acts of speech had made their way into previous poems, through irony or intimate relationships. This poem is conversely devoid of hope. While one could argue that the poem is in itself an artifact of memory, and readers commemorate the poet in the very act of reading, within the poem, the voices of the marginalized are completely quiet, not even suggested in the passive voice. A xenophobic authority is ubiquitous and the very last image is a closed mouth. The last poem of the series, “Epilog,” (“Epilogue” 1854, DHA 3,1, 236) returns to the theme of memory, but unlike the earlier “Gedächtnißfeyer,” there is a stark repudiation of glory: Unser Grab erwärmt der Ruhm. Torenworte! Narrentum! Eine beßre Wärme gibt Eine Kuhmagd, die verliebt Uns mit dicken Lippen küßt Und beträchtlich riecht nach Mist. Gleichfalls eine beßre Wärme Wärmt dem Menschen die Gedärme, Wenn er Glühwein trinkt und Punsch Oder Grog nach Herzenswunsch In den niedrigsten Spelunken, Unter Dieben und Halunken, Die dem Galgen sind entlaufen, Aber leben, atmen, schnaufen, Und beneidenswerter sind Als der Thetis großes Kind—

252  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo Der Pelide sprach mit Recht: Leben wie der ärmste Knecht In der Oberwelt ist besser, Als am stygischen Gewässer Schattenführer sein, ein Heros, Den besungen selbst Homeros. (236) Graves they say are warm’d by glory; Foolish words and empty story! Better far the warmth we prove From a cow-girl deep in love, With her arms around us flung, Reeking with the smell of dung. And that warmth is better too That man’s entrails pierces through When he drinks hot punch and wine, Or his fill of grog divine, In the vilest, meanest den ’Mongst the thieves and scum of men, Who escape the gallows daily, But who breathe and live all-gaily, With as enviable fate As e’en Thetis’ son so great.— Rightly did Pelides say: Living in the meanest way In the upper world’s worth more, Than beside the Stygian shore King of shades to be; a hero Such as Homer sang is zero. (Bowring 544) The poem begins, like “Weltlauf,” with an ironic statement. While “Weltlauf’s” ironic meaning hinges on the audiences’ complicit realization that the poetic voice is facetious, “Epilog” clarifies, in the second line, that the first line is not meant earnestly. The poetic voice plays with the assumed convention that glory warms our graves. He lures readers to agree with this notion in order to quickly subvert it. The poetic voice employs the collective assumption that glory, in this case the enthusiastic commemoration of the deceased and of his grave as his site of tribute, does produce warmth. Instead, it is a personal episodic memory of sensorial experiences, such as the smell and effect of wine, that produces warmth. To answer the question of whether one should sacrifice one’s happiness and pleasure in order to secure the preservation of one’s body of work, avoid forgetfulness and enter the historical-mythic text, the

No Mass or Kaddish  253 poetic voice prefers mundane joy to fame. The voice of Achilles appears in the last few lines, a figure famous for paying a high price for fame over the comforts of a quiet life forgotten. The Achilles in the poem, however, would choose to live a life of laboring hardship if it meant remaining longer in the world. This statement seems to describe Heine’s life of enormous physical strain. The simplest of pleasures, a kiss, even in unromantic conditions, is better than glory in Homer’s mouth or words. The voices of the poet and Achilles overlap. But it could not have been lost on the poet that even if Achilles had wanted life over fame, he would have had to sacrifice simple joys in order to live on in the world. The issue of memory then remains in tension even in this poem, one of Heine’s last published poems, an epilogue to life itself. The poems analyzed showcase the poet’s grave preoccupation with remembrance. Because the poetic voice and his stance comes from a place of exile and pain, the poems take a collective attribute that is necessarily political. The poet foreshadows that his legacy would be tense and complicated, at times admitting to scarce heroism, at times asserting a defense for the marginalized with the effective tool of fierce irony. Even at the very end, the problem of commemoration of the poet and his work remains in tension and unresolved. The poet would not reveal how he would be remembered, but he did provide insight into the politization of his commemoration throughout the centuries. As Sammons, Holub, Kahn, and Hook illustrate, although Heine’s poetry is nowadays firmly part of German and Jewish literary canons, his inclusion and rejection have depended on the political and social stances of his readers and how they remember not only his work, but his life, his religion, and his experiences. The treatment of statues and memorials erected to the memory of Heine have been representative of his turbulent reception. For example, the Jewish Daily Bulletin of August 29, 1926 reported, almost a decade before his books would be burned in the Bebelplatz, that “the first public memorial in Germany to Heinrich Heine was unveiled in [Hamburg]” on August 13. This unveiling was indeed political, since it was accompanied by a speech from “the Lord Mayor of Hamburg, Dr. Petersen, who … condemned the act of the anti-Semites some time ago in desecrating the statute while it was still private property standing in the Hamburg Art Gallery” (1). Similarly, the “Lorelei Fountain,” the Heinrich Heine memorial in the Bronx, New York City, was the constant target of vandalism for decades after it was unveiled in 1899. As Christopher Gray asserts, the fountain “was mired in international politics and ethnic animosity from the beginning” (no page number). As right as Heine was that his work would be politicized, he was wrong that it could disappear into oblivion. The complex reception of his monuments and words made of stone might have surprised him. Unlike what he might have expected in the first few lines of “Gedächtnißfeyer,” his death was followed by anything but silence.

254  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo

Notes 1 David Shyovitz explains that the Mourner’s Kaddish is a “liturgical custom first attested in late twelfth-early thirteenth-century Ashkenazic halakhic texts” (49). It reframed the older liturgical Kaddish, which “had already been a key component of the Jewish liturgy for many centuries,” now as a “prayer for the dead” (49). The Kaddish must be uttered in a Minyan, a quorum of 10 men over the age of 13 (although sometimes women can be counted, see Fine, Rabbi David J. “Women and the Minyan”). This quorum is representative of a “community of Israel” (Britannica). Interestingly, by questioning whether a Kaddish would be said upon his death, Heine doubts both the practical possibility of a quorum of ten adults willing to commemorate him and the symbolic impossibility of being remembered by a “community of Israel.” Mass is “the central act of worship of the Roman Catholic Church, which culminates in celebration of the sacrament of the Eucharist” (Green). 2 Deleuze and Guattari describe “minor literature” as one that “takes a collective value,” thus placing the responsibility of the transcendence of Heine’s poetry to his community of readers. Memory for Heine’s late poetry is thus an issue of the collective and political. 3 For a thoughtful discussion of Walter Benjamin’s use of Erlebnis in his study of Marcel Proust’s contributions to the study of memory as consciousness and experience, see Evelyn Elder, Architects of Memory. 4 This translation comes from Jay Winter’s War beyond Words: Languages of Remembrance from the Great War to the Present. Winter argues that the plaque with Heine’s words and the underground library, another monument in Bebelplatz, are “disappearing monuments” aimed to symbolize the “progressive disappearance” of the Jewish population in Berlin, which was reduced from “185,000 in 1939” to “a few hundred in 1946” (154–55). 5 For an insightful reading of Heine’s Confessions, refer to Robert C. Holub’s “Confessions of an Apostate: Heine’s Conversion and Its Psychic Displacement.” 6 For a thorough analysis of Heine’s influence on German-Jewish writers, refer to Kahn and Hook’s “The Impact of Heine on Nineteenth-Century GermanJewish Writers.” 7 Here, “body politic” should be understood in terms of Thomas Hobbes as the counterpart to the “natural” and individual body, “a Commonwealth … made by the wills and agreement of men” (quoted in Zarka 76). 8 David Constantine’s “Heine’s Lazarus Poems,” in Heine und die Weltliteratur and Sammons’ “The Poet Prostrate: Romanzero,” in Heinrich Heine: The Elusive Poet provide insightful readings of this complex poetry collection as a whole, its context, and secondary sources. 9 For readers interested in the first part of the Romanzero, Gerhard Höhn provides a brilliant analysis in his article “Heine’s Conception of History After 1848.” In it, Höhn comments that Heine depicts a “world that has gone completely haywire, a world where dialectics have long been abandoned … not dominated by reason and common sense but by senselessness … No matter where the narrative chooses to venture, whether it be world history, biography, or the story of individual nations, it always comes down to the same basic pattern of ascent, decline, and ruin—that is, a pointless cycle that embraces the entirety of human greatness and beauty in its crushing hoop” (178). 10 All English translations of Heine’s poems are by Edgar Alfred Bowring. They keep the original meter.

No Mass or Kaddish  255 11 Lanser’s rule states: “In the absence of any text-internal clues as to the narrator’s (poetic voice’s) sex, use the pronoun appropriate to the author’s sex; i.e., assume that the narrator is male if the author is male, and that the narrator is female if the author is female, respectively” (166). 12 For a discussion of the symbolic connection between flowers and memory, see also Christina M. Weiler’s and Robert E. Mottram’s chapters in this volume. 13 All translations from Freud’s Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten come from A.A. Brill, Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious. 14 A few decades before Heine’s collection, in 1838, Alexis de Tocqueville published De la démocratie en Amérique [Democracy in America]. In it, he praised the Republican Project but asserted that the youth of the nation would be the cause of great sorrows and delays to any semblance of equality: “Many ages must elapse before the divers offsets of the British race in America cease to present the same homogeneous characteristics: and the time cannot be foreseen at which a permanent inequality of conditions will be established in the New World. Whatever differences may arise, from peace or from war, from freedom or oppression, from prosperity or want, between the destinies of the different descendants of the great Anglo-American family, they will at least preserve an analogous social condition, and they will hold in common the customs and the opinions to which that social condition has given birth…. The time will therefore come when one hundred and fifty millions of men will be living in North America, equal in condition, the progeny of one race, owing their origin to the same cause, and preserving the same civilization, the same language, the same religion, the same habits, the same manners, and imbued with the same opinions, propagated under the same forms. The rest is uncertain, but this is certain; and it is a fact new to the world—a fact fraught with such portentous consequences as to baffle the efforts even of the imagination” (Tocqueville, no page number). 15 For example, Roger Cook studies the Lazarus cycle in the Romanzero alongside “the eleven poems in a section of Gedichte 1853 und 1854 entitled ‘Zum Lazarus’” (121), calling these last ones “supplementary poems.”

Works Cited Cook, Roger. “Riddle of Love: Romantic Poetry and Historical Progress.” A Companion to the Works of Heinrich Heine. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2002. 257–61. Constantine, David. “Heine’s Lazarus Poems.” Heine und die Weltliteratur. Ed. T.J. Reed and Alexander Stillmark. Oxford and London: Legenda, 2000, 202–14. Deleuze, Gilles, and Guattari, Felix. Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature. Theory and History of Literature 30. Minneapolis and London: U of Minnesota P, 1986. Ender, Evelyne. Architexts of Memory: Literature, Science, and Autobiography. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 2005. Ferguson, Frances. “Romantic Memory.” Studies in Romanticism, 35.4, (1996): 509–33. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/25601195. Fine, Rabbi David J. “Women and the Minyan.” Committee on Jewish Law and Standards of the Rabbinical Assembly. Rabbinical Assembly, 2012. “First Heine Memorial in Germany is Unveiled.” Jewish Daily Bulletin. [New York, NY], 29. Aug 1926. http://pdfs.jta.org/1926/1926-08-29_561.pdf. Freud, Sigmund. Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewussten. Frankfurt a. M.: Fischer Verlag, 1970.

256  Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo ———. Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious. Trans. A.A. Brill. London: Moffat, Yard & Co., 1916. Gray, Christopher. “Sturm und Drang Over a Memorial to Heinrich Heine.” The New York Times. 27 May 2007. https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/27/ realestate/27scap.html. Green, Robert. “Mass.” Encyclopædia Britannica. June 12 2019. https://www. britannica.com/topic/mass-Christian-religious-service. Grossman, Jeffrey. “Heine and Jewish Culture: The Poetics of Appropriation.” A Companion to the Works of Heinrich Heine. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2002, 257–61. Heine, Heinrich. Almansor. Eds. Erwin Kalischer and Raimund Pissin. Project Gutenberg, 2014. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/45600. ———. “Die Götter im Exil.” Vermischte Schriften. Vol. 9. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1854a, 215–67. ———. “Geständnisse.” Vermischte Schriften. Vol. 15. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1854b. ———. Historisch-kritische Gesamtausgabe der Werke. Ed. Manfred Windfuhr and Frauke Bartelt. 16 vols. Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1973–1997 (Düsseldorfer Heine Ausgabe, DHA). ———. The Complete Poems of Heinrich Heine: A Modern English Version. Ed. and trans. Hal Draper. Boston: Suhrkamp/Insel, 1986. ———. The Poems of Heine. Trans. Edgar Alfred Bowring. London: George Bell and Sons, 1908. ———. The Prose Writings of Heinrich Heine. Ed. Havelock Ellis. Project Gutenberg, 2011. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/37478/37478-h/37478-h. htm ———. Werke und Briefe. Ed. Hans Kaufmann. Berlin: Aufbau-Verlag, 1961. Höhn, Gerhard. “Heine’s conception of History After 1848.” A Companion to the Works of Heinrich Heine. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2002, 257–61. Holub, Robert C. “Deutscher Dichter jüdischer Herkunft.” Ich Narr des Glücks: Heinrich Heine 1797–1856: Bilder einer Austellung. Ed. Joseph A. Kruse, Ulrike Reuter, and Martin Hollender. Stuttgart: J.B. Metzler, 1997. Kahn, Lothar, and Donald D. Hook. “The Impact of Heine on NineteenthCentury German-Jewish Writers.” The Jewish Reception of Heinrich Heine. Ed. Mark H. Gelber. Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1992, 53–66. Lanser, Susan Sniader. The Narrative Act: Point of View in Prose Fiction. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1981. “Minyan.” Encyclopædia Britannica. 02 Feb. 2018. https://www.britannica.com/ topic/minyan. The New York Times. “Nazis Ban Song ‘Lorelei’ Because Heine Wrote It.” The New York Times. 15. Nov. 1938. https://www.nytimes.com/1938/11/15/archives/ nazis-ban-song-lorelei-because-heine-wrote-it.html?searchResultPosition=1 Richardson, Alan. “Memory and Imagination in Romantic Literature.” The Memory Process: Neuroscientific and Humanistic Perspectives. Ed. Suzanne Nalbantian, Paul M. Matthews, and James L. McClelland. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011, 277–96. Sammons, Jeffrey. Heinrich Heine: A Modern Biography. Princeton UP, 1979. ———. “The Poet Prostrate: Romanzero.” Heinrich Heine. The Elusive Poet. New Haven: Yale UP, 1969, 349–97.

No Mass or Kaddish  257 ———. “Who Did Heine Think He Was?” Heinrich Heine’s Contested Identities: Politics, Religion, and Nationalism in Nineteenth-Century Germany. Ed. Jost Hermand and Robert Holub. New York: Peter Lang, 1999, 1–24. Schacter, Daniel L., Donna Rose Addis, and Randy L. Buckner, “Remembering the Past to Imagine the Future: The Prospective Brain.” Nature Reviews: Neuroscience, 8, Sep. 2007, 657. Shyovitz, David I. “‘You have Saved Me from the Judgment of Gehenna’: The Origins of the Mourner’s Kaddish in Medieval Ashkenaz.” Association for Jewish Studies. AJS Review, 39(1), 2015, 49–73. Tocqueville, Alexis de. Democracy in America. Trans. Henry Reeve. Project Gutenberg, 2013. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/815. Winter, Jay. War Beyond Words: Languages of Remembrance from the Great War to the Present. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2017. Zarka, Yves Charles. “First Philosophy and the Foundation of Knowledge.” The Cambridge Companion to Hobbes. Ed. Tom Sorell. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 1996.

Index

Pages in italics refer to figures and pages followed by n refer to notes. Aarne, Annti 185, 199n19, 205 Aðalsteinsdóttir, Auður 203n60, 205 Addis, Donna Rose 91, 88n10, 234, 257 Adorno, Theodor 125–27, 136; “field of tension” 127; Minima Moralia 125–27 Aesthetics 9, 121–23, 133n2, 134n3, 134n5, 136–37, 175n1, 175n9, 179 Allan, Seán 44n3, 47 Allert, Beate I. 112n22, 175n7, 177n22, 178n30–n31 anamnesis 24 Anderson, Benedict 225–26, 231 Angress (Klüger), Ruth 44n2, 45 anti-semitism 218, 221–24, 229 Assmann, Aleida 13, 17, 204n82, 205, 211 Assmann, Jan 199n16, 205, 211–12, 217, 231; Identitätskonkretheit 185 Auðunsdóttir, Arndís Hulda 202n49, 203n60–n61, 205 Auerbach, Berthold 220, 236 autobiography 4, 8, 16, 18, 57, 70–1, 73–9, 81, 86–7, 88n6–n8, 88n11, 90–1, 255 Bachelard, Gaston 12–3, 17, 211, 230–31; The Poetics of Space 12, 211 Bahr, Hermann 224 Bambocciaden 95, 109n7, 114n30, 114, 116 Bancila, Mihaela 153n11, 154, 154n20

Barthes, Roland 127–28, 131, 133, 136 Basabe, Nere 200n25, 206 Becker, Andrew Sprague 175n2, 178 Becker-Cantarino, Barbara 114n30, 114 Belgum, Kirsten 225–26, 231 Benjamin, Walter 119, 134n4, 135n15, 136, 149, 153n13, 154n19, 155, 254n3 Bergson, Henri 7, 50, 54, 56–65, 65n6, 67n21, 68, 68n23, 154n19; Bergson’s memory cone 60; Bergson’s model 50; Time and Free Will 58–9, 61, 63, 68; Matter and Memory 7, 56, 59–61, 63, 65, 67n21, 68n23 Berliner Börsen-Courier 221 Bernhardi, August Ferdinand 95, 109n7, 114 Binder, Wolfgang 44n2, 45 Blackwell, Jeannine 108n1–n2, 109n7, 113n28, 114n29, 115–16 Blod, Gabriele 88n7–n8, 88n11, 90 Blumenberg, Hans 124, 136, 178 Böhn, Andreas 89n21, 90 Borgfirðingur, Jón 193, 203n62, 206 Bowring, Edgar Alfred 239–47, 249–50, 252, 254n10, 256 Brantly, Susan 113n24, 114 Breiðfjörð, Sigurður 14, 190–91, 193, 200n33, 201n34, 202n49–n51, 203n56, 203n62–n64, 206–07, 209 Breithaupt, Fritz 149, 155 Brentano, Clemens 11, 158, 163–66, 170–72, 174, 176n13–n15, 176n17, 177n20, 178

Index  259 Breuer, Moses 109n7, 114n30, 114 Brown, Marshall 111n18, 114 Bruner, Jerome 145, 155 Bruyn, Wolfgang von 109n7, 114, 116 Burwick, Frederick 49, 65n5, 68, 161, 178 Byrd, Vance 143–44, 151, 152n5, 154n18, 155 Calhoon, Kenneth S. 135n20, 136 Carruthers, Mary 17n12, 18 Catholicism 6, 18, 24–5, 172, 213, 254 Chase, Cynthia 133n2, 136 Cheeke, Stephen 160, 175n1, 175n9, 178 Cheng, Vincent J. 204n68, 206 Clason, Christopher R. 65n3, 67n19, 87n3–n4, 90 Cohn, Dorrit 44n5, 45 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor 17n11, 52–3, 64, 65n3, 65n8, 68, 68n22, 69; Biographia Literaria 17n11, 52, 65n8 Colombo, Pamela 17n18, 19 Cometa, Michele 138–40, 147, 152n3, 155 Connerton, Paul 17, 183–84, 199n14, 204n72, 204n74, 206 Constantine, David 254n8, 255 Cook, Roger 139–40, 143, 151, 152n2, 153n17, 154n25, 155, 238, 255n15, 255 Corballis, Michael 17n13, 19, 88n10, 91 Corkhill, Alan 108n1, 115 Culler, Jonathan 127, 136 Daemmerich, Horst 89n15, 90, 153n9 Darby, David 150, 155 Deleuze, Gilles 57, 60–1, 68, 233, 236–38, 254n2, 255 Deleuze, Gilles and Felix Guattari, Toward a Minor Literature 236–38, 254n2, 255 De Man, Paul 117, 133n1–n2, 134n7, 134n11–n12, 136–37 De Quincey, Thomas 49, 68–9 Dettmering, Peter 44n3, 45 Dimpfl, Monika 231n3 Domány, Judit 88n11, 89n18, 89n21, 90

Draaisma, Douwe 17, 45n15 Driscoll, Matthew J. 198n10, 203n61, 206 Dudai, Yadin 17n12, 18 Durkheim, Emile 210 Eagleton, Terry 119, 136 Eakin, Paul John 88n6, 90 Eggert Glói 187, 189–92, 194, 196–97 Eichendorff, Joseph Freiherr von 11, 158, 170–72, 174, 178n27, 179, 214; “Abend” 170; “Der stille Grund” 170–71; “Die Nachtblume” 172; “Die wunderschöne Prinzessin” 170–71; “Verloren” 170–72; “Waldgespräch” 170–71; “Wünschelrute” 170 Eicher, Thomas 139, 143, 154n21, 155 ekphrasis 10–1, 142, 157–62, 173, 175n1–n2, 175n4, 175n7, 175n9; ekphrastic hope 160; reverse ekphrasis 159–60 Eleoma, Joshua 111n16, 115 Elisabeth, (Empress) 215–17, 230n2, 231 Elkins, James 18, 138, 143–44, 155, 157, 179 Ender, Evelyne 1, 16n1, 16n4, 16n6, 16n8–n9, 18, 233–34, 255 Erll, Astrid 1, 16n1, 17–8, 108n6, 115, 127, 156, 204n82, 205 Eschler, Ewa 108n2, 109n7, 115 Falk, Johann Daniel 29 family trauma 9, 96–7, 107, 110n15 Favorini, Attilio 16n7, 18 Fichte, Johann Gottlieb 159, 165–66, 179 Fine, Rabbi David J. 254n1, 255 Fischer, Bernd 44n3, 45 Fischer, Hans R. 220–22, 231 Fortunati,Vita 14, 18 Foster, John Burt 16n3, 18 Frank, Manfred 180, 183, 198n1, 209 Freedberg, David 16n8, 18 French Revolution 183–84, 195, 204n77 Freud, Sigmund 5, 37, 40–2, 45n12–n13, 45, 49, 65n5, 68,

260 Index 136, 243–44, 248, 255n13, 256; Fehlleistungen 41–2; Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious 248 Frye, Northrop 185, 206 Gall, Ulrich 44n2, 45 Gay, Peter 45n12, 45 Gellner, Ernest 225–26, 231 Gish, Theodor 230n1 Gíslason, Konráð 186, 188, 193–97, 199n20, 201n35, 201n40, 202n49, 203n57, 206, 209 Gíslason, Vilhjálmur 200n24, 203n60, 203n62, 206 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von 5–6, 12, 17n17, 23–4, 71, 79, 127, 135n18, 159, 161–62, 167, 173, 218, 229; Faust 6, 23, 167–68, 177n22; Iphegenia auf Tauris 6 Goltschnigg, Dietmar 223, 231 Gombrich, E.H. 10, 18 Graham, Ilse 44n3, 46 Gray, Christopher 253, 256 Gribnitz, Barbara 109n7, 114, 116 Grimm, Jakob and Wilhelm 188, 196, 205n83 Grossman, Jeffrey 235, 256 Guattari, Felix 236–38, 254n2 Guðlaugsson, Jónas 202n52, 206 Guggenheimer, Randolph 228–29 Gunnlaugsson, Gylfi 198n6, 206 Guttari, Félix 233 Guttormsson, Loftur 198n9, 206 Haberstock, Monika 108n2, 109n7, 115 Halbwachs, Maurice 210–11, 231 Hálfdanarson, Guðmundur 204n78, 206 Halldórsson, Björn 204n73, 206 Hallgrímsson, Jónas 186, 188, 194, 197, 200n24, 200n30, 200n33, 201n35, 203n58–n60, 203n62, 203n67, 205n85, 206 Hamacher, Werner 133n2, 136 Hamann, Brigitte 217, 230n2, 231 Hámundarson, Gunnar 197 Hardenberg, Friedrich von see “Novalis” Harich, Walther 89n19, 90 Hartley, David 52 Hassig, Debra 177n20, 179

Heine, Heinrich 11, 14–5, 113n26, 121, 133, 158, 160, 166–70, 172, 174, 177n19, 210–30, 231n5, 233–39, 241, 243–44; Bebelplatz plaque 235; Book of Songs 214–15; deterritorialization 248–49; “Die Lore-Ley” 166; Disputation from the Romancero 223; Faust ballet 167; Gedächtnißfeyer” 15, 233, 238, 247, 251, 253; “Geständnisse” 236; Lamentationen 241; Lyrisches Intermezzo 169; poetic voice and symbolic language 217; Romanzero 238, 249 Helgason, Árni 189, 193, 203n54, 207 Helgason, Jón Karl. 198n5, 207 Helgason, Þórður 198n11 Hempel, Friedrich 130 Hennig, John 17n17, 18 Herter, Ernst 217, 220, 223, 226, 228 Heyse, Paul 217–20 Hirmir, Max 176n10, 179 Hobbes, Thomas 254n7 Hoffmann, E.T.A. 7–8, 12, 49–54, 57–8, 62–5, 65n1, 70–89, 87n1, 138–52, 152n1–n3, 152n5, 153n8–n15, 154n21, 154n25; Bildungsroman 73; blotting process 85–7; Coppelius 7, 48–51, 53, 55–6, 59, 61–2, 64, 66n12; “Der goldne Topf” 48–9, 57, 63–4; “Der Sandmann” 7; “Des Vetters Eckfenster” 10, 138–52, 152n1–n2, 153n8, 153n11, 153n14; Die Elixiere des Teufels 7, 70, 73–9, 86, 87n1, 87n3, 88n12–n13, 89–91; Medardus 73–9, 84–7; Pater Spiridion 77; identity and memory 85; Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr 7, 57, 64, 66n12, 70, 78–86, 87n2–n3, 89n18, 90 Hoff-Purviance, Linda 44n2, 46 Höhn, Gerhard 254n9, 256 Holub, Robert C. 235, 253 Hook, Donald D. 235–6, 253, 254n6 Horkheimer, Max 125, 136 Hughes, Shaun F. D. 198n6, 198n12–n13, 199n15, 199n18, 201n38, 204n75, 204n81, 205n85, 207 Huyssen, Andreas 210, 212, 228–30, 232; Twilight Memories: Marking Time in a Culture of Amnesia 230

Index  261 Iacocca, Vanessa K. 203n67, 207 Icelandic premodern social memory 184 Indriðarson, Ólafur 190, 202n45, 219 Ingólfsson, Gunnlaugur 203n57, 219 institutional memory 38, 45n11, 95, 108n6, 120, 133 Ísleifsson, Sumarliði R. 200n25, 207 Janus-hypothesis 5, 17n12, 18, 72 Jarvis, Shawn C. 108n1–n2, 109n7, 113n28, 114n29, 115–6 Jewish Daily Bulletin 253, 255 Johnson, Laurie Ruth 11, 17n15, 18 Joyce Kilmer Park 228–30 Kahn, Lothar 235–36, 253, 254n6, 256 Kant, Immanuel 6–7, 9, 16n2, 23–4, 44n5, 49–50, 52–8, 66n15, 67n17, 117, 119, 123, 132, 133n2, 134n5, 134n7, 134n11, 134n12, 166, 178, 201n34; Kritik der reinen Vernunft (Critique of Pure Reason) 23, 52–5, 69 Keats, John 161, 201n34, 208 Kittler, Friedrich A. 130, 134n10, 135n21, 136 Klaar, Alfred 45n9, 46 Kleist, Heinrich von 6–7, 23–45, 112n22, 115–16, 160, 176n11, 179; Amphitryon 24, 29, 31–8, 46; amnesia 2, 6, 24–5, 35, 204n68, 206; “Die Marquise von O” 24–9, 33, 35, 38, 43n1, 44n5, 45n7, 45n9, 45–6; Käthchen von Heilbronn 24, 44n4, 46; “Michael Kohlhaas” 24, 38; Penthesilea 24, 37–40, 42–3, 44n2, 44n6, 46; Prinz Friedrich von Homburg 24, 38 Klopstock, Friedrich Gottlieb 190, 208 Knox, Julian 7, 48–68, 89n17 Konráðsson, Gísli 202n49, 203n62, 203n65, 204n75, 208 Kord, Susanne 108n6, 115 Krabiel, Klaus-Dieter 176n14, 179 Krauss, Andrea 142, 148, 153n14, 153n16, 154n23, 155 Kreisler, Johannes 57, 64 Kremer, Detlef 87n3–n4, 90, 198n3, 208

Krieger, Murray 159, 179 Kristjánsdóttir, Dagný 200n26, 208 Kristjánsson, Aðalgeir 203n60, 203n65 Kristjánsson, Kristján 201n35 Kuzniar, Alice A. 135n14 Lamberti, Elena 14, 18 Leberecht, Peter 198n2, 209 Lentwojt, Peter 175n5, 177n19, 178n27, 179 Leonhard 9, 96–107 Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim 148, 155, 159, 161, 172–73, 175n6–n7, 178, 178n29, 179 Liebrand, Claudia 153n15, 155 Lindberg, Jacob Christian 187 Locke, John 49–54, 57, 65n7, 65n9, 66n11, 67n17, 138; An Essay Concerning Human Understanding 49–54, 57, 69 Loreley 11, 158–60, 162, 167–70, 172, 174, 175n5, 175n9, 177n19–n20, 178n27, 220, 223; ekphrasis studies 162–66 Lullies, Reinhard 176n10, 179 Luther, Martin 24–5, 187 Magnússon, Sigurður Gylfi 198n10, 198n12, 208 Mahoney, Dennis F. 113n26, 116 Marcuse, Ludwig 168, 177n24, 179 Marcus, Otto 231n4 Martin, Laura 45n7, 46 Masche, Bertha M. 108n4, 116 Matenko, Percy 108n4, 116 Matthews, Paul M. 16n3, 257 Mayer, Mathias 201n38, 208 McAllister, Grant Profant, Jr. 44n3, 46 McClelland, James L. 16n3, 18–9, 88n9, 90–1, 155, 257 McGann, Jerome 134n3 Medievalism 195 Melsteð, Bogi Th 201n35, 208 memory: and aesthetics 9; as a discursive construct 1; episodic memory 72, 149, 234, 241, 252; individual and cultural memory 12; literary memory 1; and repetition 51; social memory 194 Meyer, Herman 89n18, 89n21, 90 Mitchell, David T. 111n16, 116 Mitchell, W.J.T. 160, 175n9

262 Index Molnár, Géza von 134n11, 136 Müller, Adam 44n6, 46 Müller, Cornelia 17n19, 18 Hans von Müller 87n3–n4, 89n19, 90 Müller, Ludvig Christian 187, 193, 200n32, 208 Musil, Robert 228 Nalbantian, Suzanne 3, 16n3, 16n7–n8, 18–9, 88, 90–1, 155, 257 Nehring, Wolfgang 17n17, 87n3–n4, 91 Neumann, Birgit 109n8, 115 Nienhaus, Stefan 112n20, 115 Nietzsche, Friedrich 125, 130, 135n16, 135n22, 136, 203n66, 208 Nora, Pierre 211, 232 Novalis (Friedrich von Hardenberg), Heinrich von Ofterdingen 9, 18, 112n21, 113n26, 114n29, 115–37, 134n8, 135n14, 135n20, 159–60, 180, 214 Nünning, Ansgar 1, 16n9, 17–8, 108n6, 115, 156, 204n82, 205 O’Brien, William Arctander 134n10, 137 O’Connor, Ralph 199n13, 208 Ólafsson, Davíð 198n10, 198n12, 202n49, 208 Ólsen, Björn M. 201n35, 203n62, 208 Partos, Timea 8, 180 Pater, Walter 158, 180 Paul, Jean (John Paul Friedrich Richter) 125, 158, 161, 175n3, 180 Paxton, Anna 60, 69 Pethes, Nicolas 1 Pfau, Thomas 118, 124, 137, 177n23, 177n26, 180 Poe, Allen Edgar 153n9, 155 Politzer, Heinz 44n5, 46 Porterfield, Allen Wilson 176n17, 177n20, 180 Proust, Marcel 3, 16n1, 162, 254n3 Pyle, Forest 120, 137 Rahmenschau 142, 153n14, 155 Rau, Johannes 229 Readings, Bill 133, 137 Redfield, Marc 119–20, 123, 134n3, 137

Reeves, Nigel 43n1, 44n2, 44n4, 46 Richard, Ernest 227 Richardson, Alan 2, 5, 6, 16n3, 16n5, 17n11, 17n13, 19, 71, 88n9, 139, 148, 155, 234 Ricoeur, Paul 45n11 rímur 184, 187, 190, 193–95, 197, 198n11, 198n12, 199n21, 200n33, 203n56, 203n61, 204n70, 204n75 Rímur af Tistrani og Indiönu 193 Rosegger, Peter 15, 220–6; “Der vernünftige Antisemitismus” 221, 232 Rotrou, Jean 29 Ruchatz, Jens 1, 19 Sammons, Jeffrey L. 229, 232, 235, 243, 253, 254n8, 257 Sæmundsson, Tómas 186–88, 190–91, 193, 200n27, 200n29–n30, 201n34, 202n49, 205n83, 208–9 Schacter, Daniel L. 72, 88n10, 91, 146, 149, 154n24, 155, 234, 257 Schiller, Friedrich 119, 120, 134n5, 134n7, 134n11, 137, 161–62, 176n12, 180, 201n34, 221, 227; Aesthetic Education 119, 134, 137 Schindel, Estela 17n18, 19 Schlegel, Friedrich 5, 18; progressive Universalpoesie 5 Schmidt, Herminio 44n4 Schmidt, Jochen 44n3 Schmidt, Ricarda 44n3 Schönerer, Georg von 218, 221 Schubert, Dietrich 135n23, 213, 217, 229, 232 Schubert, Franz 135n23 Schumann, Clara 177n19, 228 Schütze, Hermann 218–20, 232 Scott, Walter 12, 17n16–n17, 18–9, 196, 204n79, 205n83 Sembdner, Helmut 43n1, 44n6, 46, 115 Shakespeare 84 Shyovitz, David I. 254n1, 257 Sigurðsson, Páll 205n89, 209 Sigurjónsson, Sveinbjörn 202n49, 202n50, 203n63, 209 Silcher, Friedrich 177n19, 228 Sistine Madonna 7, 25 Snyder, Sharon L. 111n16, 116 Solso, Richard 138, 156

Index  263 Spurkland, Terje 199n18, 209 Stelzig, Eugene 88n6, 91 Stephens, Anthony 44n3, 47 Stephensen, Magnús 184–85, 196, 199n17 Stewart, Garret 131, 137 Stonebridge, George Ehler 231n5 Strachey, James 41, 68 Straub, Juergen 19, 139, 152n4, 154n22, 156 Streller, Siegfried 44n3, 47 Suddendorf, Thomas 17n13, 19, 88n10, 91 Sunnanpósturinn 14, 189–90, 193, 201n40, 203n55–n56, 209 Sütterlin, Nicole 48, 65n2, 69, 89n14, 91 Sverrisson, Eiríkur 189, 209 Tatar, Maria 44n4, 47 Thompson, Stith 185, 199n19, 205 Þorláksson, Jón 190, 202n47, 208 Thorsteinsson, Bjarni 191–92 Thorsteinsson, Steingrímur 192, 202n52, 209 Tieck, Ludwig 14, 95, 108n5, 134n12, 183, 196, 198n1, 201n36; “Der blonde Eckbert” 13–4, 112, 161,

183–97, 198n3, 198n5, 200n30, 202n52, 205n88, 207, 209 Tieck, Sophie (Bernhardi von Knorring) 8, 95–116; “Der Greis im Felsen” 8, 95, 116 Tismar, Jens 201n38, 208 Tocqueville, Alexis de 255n14, 257 Ullrich, Volker 198n12, 209 Walther, Robert 88, 91 Warburg, Aby 211 Weiler, Christina M. 255n12 Wellbery, David E. 130–31, 135n18, 137 Wells, G.A. 112n22, 116 White, Deborah Elise 119–20, 135n17, 137 Wiederholungszwang 149 Wildenbruch, Ernst von 220, 223 Winter, Jay 235, 254n4, 257 Wittkowski, Wolfgang 44n2–n3, 47 Wordsworth, William 52, 69, 133n1 Zeydel, Edwin H. 108n4, 116 Zimmermann, Maria 229, 232 Ziolkowski, Theodore 45n15, 47, 135n13, 137