Penthesileas Versprechen: Exemplarische Studien über die literarische Referenz. (Reihe Litterae, 162) by Rüdiger Campe

Abstract

n8o Reviews to recent biographical work might have been preferable to conjecture. It will be interesting to see how the editors deal with the very much more challenging task of contextualizing letters from the author's maturer years. What we have for themoment is a gallon in a pint pot that leaves the reader thirsting formore. University of Kent Osman Durrani Penthesileas Versprechen: Exemplarische Studien uber die literarische Referenz. Ed. by Rudiger Campe. (Reihe Litterae, 162) Freiburg i.Br.: Rombach. 2008. 378 pp. 44. ISBN 978-3-7930-9536-1. Sceptics might wonder why a volume of essays on Kleist's play Penthesilea is needed, given the extraordinary amount of secondary literature on Kleist generally and on thisplay inparticular. In his introduction, Rudiger Campe remarks that the impetus for thevolume originated from theperception thatmost studies of theplay from the last twenty-fiveyears were limited by their adherence to one of two 'falsche Alternativen' (p. 9): either an 'intensiv' close reading of the play, or an extensiv' reading drawing links to its cultural context. This seems a curious argument, given that,while most critics necessarily place greater emphasis on one approach than the other, there aremany excellent studies that combine both approaches successfully. None the less, thisvolume contains much that isvaluable. Its chief strength is that itoffersa series of thoughtful?though sometimes recondite?essays that illuminate a number of challenging aspects of theplay. It isnot possible todeal with all thirteen essays here, but a selective surveywill review some noteworthy contributions. One group of essays deals with the language of the play. Carol Jacobs's contribution, a German rendering ofmaterial from hermonograph Uncontainable Romanticism (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989), argues that the play presents a confrontation between literal and figurative language. Marianne Schuller shows how metaphors of light are used to such excess in theplay that language loses itspower of reference, a theme developed byGerhard Neumann. Neumann shows how images take on a lifeof their own in the play, and suggests thatKleist creates a 'Theater,welches das Brechen der Reprasentationskraft der Sprache, das Versagen ihrerReferenz, in Szene setzt' (p. 122). A number of essays consider the play's aesthetic qualities. Helmut Schneider addresses the play's relationship toWeimar classicism, arguing convincingly that it negates the possibility of a geschlossenen Buhnenillusion' (p. 131) or of a Vergeistigenden Ausgleich' (p. 145). Less well supported is Schneider's contention that Penthesilea kills Achilles for betraying her in her search for an independent identity.Noting affinitiesbetween the reception ofPenthesilea and the eighteenth century reception of Shakespeare inGermany, Bianca Theisen argues that Kleist enacts the return of a previously excluded grotesque corporeality to the theatre. Bernhard Greiner reads Penthesilea as a contribution to eighteenth-century debates on aesthetics. Greiner reviews the treatment of the sublime inKant and Schiller, and suggests that the heroine's rejection ofAchilles' offerof amock combat represents the refusal of Spiel. Moreover, Greiner interprets Penthesileas processing of her MLR, 105.4, 2010 1181 killing as an erhabene Wende' (p. 201). While Greiner's reading operates at a high level of abstraction and assumes a systematic understanding of idealist philosophy on Kleist's part, it is a suggestive and powerful contribution to the understanding of the play, not least because ithelps to explain certain obscure turns of phrase. A number of other essays view the play in the context of discourses of gender, sexuality, and politics. In her contribution, Katrin Pahl criticizes the assumption that Achilles and Penthesilea embody normative ideas of gender and sexual orientation, and argues that Penthesileas 'homosexuellets] Begehren furOtrere' (p. 173) drives her relations with Achilles. While the play undoubtedly offers scope forqueer approaches, Pahl's argument relies on some rather forced readings of the work, while also underplaying the cosmic proportions of Penthesilea's ambition. Christian Moser considers the motif of cannibalism in Penthesilea in the context of eighteenth-century models of political organization, inwhich cannibalism connotes a transitional stage in the civilizing process, which cannot definitively be overcome. While Moser's argument?that the play questions the teleological belief of the Enlightenment in human progress?is not new, his essay makes a genuine contribution by demonstrating how the play is embedded in awider network of eighteenth...