Illusio der Autonomie: Carolin Amlingers Studie über literarische Arbeit

Abstract

Carolin Amlinger's <i>Schreiben. Eine Soziologie literarischer Arbeit</i> is a large-scale, but still coherent analysis of contemporary literary production in Germany. Inspired by Pierre Bourdieu's field theory, trained in critical theory, and based on interviews with authors she interpreted using qualitative methods, Amlinger combines three approaches: a history of the (West) German literary market and the development of the literary public sphere from 1871 to the recent present, an account of institutions in the present-day German literary scene, and an analysis of the habitus of contemporary authors. Amlinger shows how literary work today is characterized by a blurring of the boundaries between market and public. According to her observation, this development goes hand in hand with an essentialization of authorship – an understanding that justifies precarious work with the promise of creative self-realization. As the review argues, this results in an analytical balancing act: on the one hand, to show how literary writing and the notion of it are reshaped, and at the same time to remain sensitive to the resistance of literary practices and to concepts of authorship that oppose a neoliberal notion of labor. Amlinger's refraining from complementing authors' self-conceptions with observations of actual practices and the products of literary labor make it difficult for the study to consistently pursue both perspectives.