Wortatlas der deutschen Umgangssprachen by Jürgen Eichhoff (review)

Abstract

MLRy 99.1,2004 235 of social, political, sexual, ethnic, and gendered categories of marginality that are critically examined in her work. The introduction opens by addressing the labels of 'difficult' and 'cryptic' that have been associated with Eltit's texts since the publication of her first,and radically experimental, novel, Lumperica, in 1983. Norat acknowledges that the fragmentation of language and plot, and the character marginality found in Eltit's texts, may have distanced some readers and critics, but she seeks to redress this by locating Eltit within the postmodernist tendency to interrogate genre boundaries and models of identity. Noting that the female body is central to Eltit's narrative, Norat simultaneously draws on feminist theory in order to construct a general theoretical framework that she describes as a feminist/postmodernist one. The introductory chapter outlines the debates surrounding postmodernism in Latin America, while also exploring the differences and points of intersection that exist between postmodernism and feminism. Norat uses Eltit's fourth novel, Vaca Sagrada (1993), to exemplify her argument that Eltit's writing is 'undeniably female-centred while at the same time wholly post? modern' (p. 23). This essay examines the textual instability and ambiguity of Vaca Sagrada in terms of postmodernist theories, while exploring the narrative inscription of female experience through the menstrual blood that emanates from the body ofthe protagonist/narrator, Francisca. While this study examines categories of marginality throughout, other essays veer away from the postmodernist/feminist slant in order to employ a range of theoretical approaches that emphasize what Norat describes as 'the interpretative richness which Eltit's texts offerthe literary critic' (p. 17). Each essay is written to stand alone, but when collated into a book-length study of this kind, the disparate theoretical explorations at times result in a sense of disjointedness. Throughout the study, Norat aims to initiate a dialogue between Eltit's novels and other Latin American narrative, most notably in the essay on El cuarto mundo (1989), a substantial part of which offersa comparative reading of this novel with Cristobal Nonato, by Carlos Fuentes. A sense of historical moment is given, as the texts are placed within the socio-political and cultural context of the Pinochet dictatorship. Further reference could have been made to the post-dictatorship period in Chile (since 1990), a point that would help to locate Eltit's later texts. Biographical information regarding the author and Eltit's own comments in published interviews regarding her work are supplied, and the bibliography is comprehensive, although Eugenia Brito's Campos minados (literatura post-golpe en Chile) (Santiago: Cuarto Propio, 1990) is notably absent. However, the clear and detailed analysis of key passages of Eltit's texts and the numerous interpretative possibilities that this study opens up make it a useful and timely introduction for students who are approaching Eltit's work for the firsttime. University of Manchester Mary Green Wortatlas der deutschen Umgangssprachen, Vol. iv. By Jurgen Eichhoff. Bern and Munich: Saur. 2000. 41 pp.; 80 maps; 12 pp. index; foldinglist of places. ?54. ISBN 3-907820-55-x(hbk). This volume completes what has become the standard work of reference on regional variation in the lexis of modern German. In effect,what we have here is the second volume ofthe second stage. The firsttwo volumes, published by Francke in 1977-78, presented the results of investigations made in the early 1970s, whereas the present volume, together with the third (which appeared with K. G. Saur in 1993), derives from later surveys conducted largely between 1980 and 1990, which involved a higher proportion of indirect questionnaires (526 of 619) than the firstsurvey. The places 236 Reviews surveyed were basically the same as previously, with the addition of Luxembourg and one town (Kaltern) in South Tyrol. The format of the third and fourth volumes is (thankfully) identical to that of the firsttwo, despite the change of publisher, and the whole work is quite simply a mine of useful and fascinating information, and an indispensable record of the geographical differences in the vocabulary of German. In practice, Jiirgen Eichhoff's pioneering work has also contributed immensely to our understanding of the nature of variation in modern German. Rather than...