Friedrich Wolfzettel , Peter Ihring (review)

Abstract

Reviews 872 literary works, itis rejected herebecauseofitsimplication thatthere are also epigones (ajudgment ofUlrich nolonger from themodern point ofview, butfrom what preceded him inthe thirteenth century). Thesingularity ofeachofthese versions isalsobrought outinthe caseofHeinrich vonFreiberg, whodiffers notmerely from Gottfried, butalsofrom Ulrich, sothat we needtoseekoutthese differences, rather thanconflate their works as mere continuations ofGottfried. Theintertextual references toGottfried (andtoEilhart) serve tohighlight thealternative version given byHeinrich, whose interpretation of the story isspecifically from a religious point ofview, providing a negative exemplum. Thisconfirms Peter Strohschneider's judgment that these medieval continuations donotmerely conclude thenarrative action oftheearlier work, butalsomake use ofittodevelop their owndiscourses. A handful ofdetails maran otherwise illuminating argument. The author is strangely reluctant totell usprecisely what she means ontwo central points. Nowhere doesshedefine 'mehrfaches Erzahlen' (isitenough tosaythat itinvolves specific realizations of the 'possibleworlds'latentwithin a story?) or 'conceptional orality' (although itappears tobeequated with 'fictive orality' or'secondary orality'). Although theinclusion ofthetheme orality andwriting inhersurvey is tobe welcomed, closer knowledge ofthe problems involved would havemadetheauthor hesitate before suggesting (p. II9) thatverbslikehoArin and sagin withEilhart necessarily imply orality orthelanguage ofproximity. Finally, English readers will besurprised tobetold that SirWrzstrem isin'neuenglisch' (p. I26).However, these are quibbles. TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE D. H. GREEN Erzahlstrukturen derArtusliteratur. Forschungsgeschichte und neueAnsatze. Ed.byFRIEDRICH WOLFZETTEL with PETER IHRING. Tubingen: Niemeyer. I999. Xi+ 366PP. DM I42. Thisvolume, theproceedings ofa symposium oftheGerman section ofthe International Arthurian Society heldin I998,follows onepublished in I993by Niemeyer: Fiktionalitat imArtusroman, editedby Volker Mertens and Friedrich Wolfzettel. The twovolumes alsobelong closely together thematically, sincethe more detailed andcomplex the structural arrangement ofa work is,the more clearly itbelongs tothe realm offiction rather than tothe scrappy, disordered contingencies ofeveryday life. Thevolume under review contains eighteen papers (inevitably of varying quality), arranged infour sections. Section I (historiography, epicandromance) hasthree essays: byFritz Peter Knapp(onhistoriography andfictional writing inthesecond half ofthe twelfth century), Dorothea Kullmann (early forms ofparallel plots inepic andromance) andPeter Ihring (thestructural function ofMerlin's prophecies in Arthurian literature). Section 2focuses ona specific, butcrucial theme (the double pathordoublecycle intheclassical Arthurian romance), with contributions by Elisabeth Schmid (a spirited attack on thistheory), Brigitte Burrichter (on the bipartite structure ofChretien's romances), Walter Haug(the Arthurian structure ofYvain/Iwein) andFriedrich Wolfzettel (the double pathandbiography). Section 3 (structural models andconventions) brings essays byMatthias Meyer (structure and person intheArthurian romance), Ulrich Ernst (forms ofanalytic narration in Parzival), Peter Kern(Arthurian romance conventions inDiuCrone), Albert Gier (structures intheEscanor ofGirart d'Amiens) andMonika Unzeitig-Herzog (the MLR,96.3,200 I 873 conclusions ofArthurian romances). The lastsection (proseromance andnonArthurian literature) is understandably something ofa hotchpotch. It contains essays byUlrich Wyss (narrative structures oftheprose romance), Jorg 0. Fichte (onArthur's death), Gerhard Wild(the abandonment ofthesymbolic structure of theArthurian romance in thelateMiddleAges),BartBesamusca (narrative structures intheMiddle Dutch Lancelot compilation), KlausRidder (onReznfried von Braunschweig) andTomas Tomasek (onthe Frauendienst ofUlrich vonLiechtenstein). Despitethis widerangeofapproaches, there aremany varieties ofstructural patterning that occur inthemedieval romance, butareeither nottreated atallin thisvolumeor receiveonlyverycursory reference. Amongst thesemaybe mentioned gradation andrepetition (asinthe two parts ofthe double cycle thesis of HugoKuhn), symmetry (assuggested byDouglas Kelly for Chretien's Lancelot), the fairytale structure (aswith theapplication ofPropp's scheme toYvain), contrasts or complementarity (Parzivaland Gawan in Wolfram's version, or indeedin Chretien's), typology (suggested ina secularized form more than oncefor Gottfried's Eristan) ortheordo artificialis (well known totheMiddle Ages from Virgil's Aeneid). If features such asthese, fully athome inthe theme ofnarrative structures inArthurian literature, donotloomatalllargeinthis volume, this islargely because pride of placeis given tooneparticular structural pattern, thatofthedoublecycle, not merely inthesection explicitly devoted toit,butalsoelsewhere. Thismay produce anunbalanced treatment, evena negative one(because this thesis mainly comes in for critical fire), butthis isalltothe good, since Kuhn's thesis haslargely dominated German scholarship, eventhough rumblings ofdiscontent havebeenaudible for sometime now.Theundoubted valueofthis volume isthat itrehearses a range of arguments qualifying what wasindanger ofbecoming a dogma. A number ofpassing references hint atthis discontent. Schmid talks ofKuhn's 'verhangnisvolle Erfindung' (p.77),Meyeris convinced thatthetheory is no 'Konigsweg' of Arthurian interpretation (p. I56), whileWysscriticizes it as 'hermeneutischer Automatismus' (p.262) andWildseesthis particular pattern as having already exhausted itsresources bythebeginning ofthethirteenth century (p.294).Itiswith Schmid, however, that wewitness the full-scale onslaught, for she pleadsconvincingly fora recognition that thecomplexity oftheromance issuch that itsstructure cannot be subsumed under onepattern alone.Shestresses that what Kuhnfirst suggested for...