Christine Geffers Browne (review)

Abstract

258 Reviews cally opposed worlds is, however, convincing, and makes a useful contribution to the long debate on Hoffmann's understanding of the challenges of art and life. University of Strathclyde Sheila Dickson Theodor Storm: Das Spannungsverhaltniszwischen Glauben und Aberglauben in seinen Novellen. By Christine Geffers Browne. (North American Studies in Nineteenth -Century German Literature, 30) New York, Washington, Baltimore, Bern, Frankfurt a.M., Berlin, Brussels, Vienna, and Oxford: Peter Lang. 2002. xii+155 pp. SwF82;?34. ISBN 0-8204-5153-3. This well-researched monograph is the firstto present a discussion ofthe relationship between religious belief and superstition in Theodor Storm's Novellen. In a syste? matic analysis of fivenarratives, Christine Geffers Browne demonstrates the dynamic tension between the two as a destructive force in the protagonists' lives. The firsttwo chapters are devoted to the definition of faithand superstition in their theological, his? torical, and geographical context, i.e. Lutheran Protestantism between 1650 and 1880 in Schleswig-Holstein, and to Storm's own contact with religion and superstition. She shows how the distinction between Christian belief and superstition was often blurred within the Church itself, a confusion which led to a struggle between those who denied the existence ofthe Devil, demons, and witches on the one hand and those clergy who believed in and thereforefought against them on the other. These conflicting views are particularly evident in Aquis Submersus and Renate. Storm also shows problematic instances of white magic, especially in In St. Jurgen and Im Brauerhause. The fifthwork analysed is Der Schimmelreiter, where the conflict between religion and superstition is externalized and serves to characterize Hauke Haien and those who sympathize with his enlightened Christian views, while his opponents are all implicated in superstitious beliefs. Geffers Browne, in a clearly structured overview, sets out a typology ofsuperstitious practices and attitudes. This is usefully elaborated in Chapter 2, drawing on MonicaMaria Stapelberg's dissertation ('Der Aberglaube im Erzahlwerk Theodor Storms', University of Pretoria, 1994), and giving detailed examples of the significance of par? ticular animals, plants, figures,and spirits in folkbelief. This is an invaluable reference source for the present-day reader. She explains that Storm's literary use of such ma? terial, based on extensive and actively accumulated knowledge, always corresponds to its significance in reality. Her general aim is then to show the ways in which Storm uses the conflict between belief and superstition to develop character and action. The focus is on only fiveNovellen because in thirty-twoothers the strands run harmoniously in parallel, an absence ofconflictwhich corresponds to Storm's observation of his own society. In twenty-nine furthertexts neither religion nor superstition is of any structural significance and the three remaining Novellen, Im Schlofi, Veronika, and Draufien im Heidedorf, centre on either one or the other. Chapter 3 is devoted to an examination of the structural significance of the conflict between superstition and Christianity in each of the selected works in turn. The analysis of the rich texture of superstition in Renate is particularly illuminating. Here the conflict is played out within the protagonist, Josias, a Lutheran pastor who believes in witchcraft. This fine Novelle has recently appeared in English translation for the firsttime since 1909 (in Storm, Paul thePuppeteer and Other Short Fiction, trans. by Denis Jackson (London: Angel Books, 2004)). Geffers Browne concludes in a brief comparative section that in all the Novellen investigated, tragedy is the consequence of a misjudgement of the power of superstition. She also finds that there is no particular progression in the way the two elements function, except in the sense that the influence of superstition MLR, ioo.i, 2005 259 is shown to wane over the centuries, in line with Storm's realistic portrayal of life in North German communities. The systematic format has led to a degree of repetition, but this at least will allow this useful contribution to Storm studies to be read and referred to selectively. University of St Andrews Helen Chambers A Companion to the Works of Hugo von Hofmannsthal. Ed. by Thomas A. Kovach. (Studies in German Literature, Linguistics and Culture) Rochester, NY: Cam? den House. 2003. xvii + 265pp. ?50; $75. ISBN 1-57113-215-5. Research on Hugo von Hofmannsthal...