Experimenters versus Magicians: Poetic strategies of an intertextual rivalry in 19thcentury German fiction

Abstract

Even earlier than C.P. Snow's thesis of the "two cultures", Max Weber argued in 1917 that scientists are responsible for "the disenchantment of the world". At first glance, this seems to be evidenced by the science-friendly belles-lettres and literary texts of the 19th century. They focus on various scientists, experimenters, and traveling explorers who displace and "overcome" fictitious characters of magicians, necromancers, and magnetizers in literary texts. Moreover, literary programs (Emile Zola, Wilhelm Bölsche) and the "social" dramas of Naturalism fostered a scientific-like tendency of literature. According to Weber's and Snow's thesis of an antagonism between the natural scientists and literary intellectuals from the humanities, one might assume a rivalry between scientists and magicians in fiction, too. But this paper analyzes novels by Gottfried Keller and Paul Heyse exemplarily in order to show particular literary strategies which undermine this antagonism.