„Alles war gut berechnet“. Zum versteckten poetologischen Selbstkommentar in Theodor Fontanes Roman Effi Briest

Abstract

In many of his texts, Theodor Fontane ‘reveals’ his poetics of novel in a hidden manner. When reading his works, readers can receive implicit hints and references about their narrative methods, and get hints about the author’s wish about how his texts should be interpreted. Take Fontane’s Effi Briest for example. In this novel, following a traditional way, the author metaphorizes the text into a braided fabric. In view of this, we can decode the self-commentaries of the novelist about his own work. In order to convey his own poetics, Fontane also employs very different metaphorical references such as architectures, landscapes, gardens and geographical localities. By analyzing the exemplary scenarios in the novel Effi Briest, this paper tries to disclose Fontane’s hidden poetic self-commentaries which is largely ignored in the recent Fontane researches.