German Poetry Research Articles

‘Stacheldrahtpoesie’ – German poetry in British internment camp newspapers during the First World War

ABSTRACT In general, poems are a well-researched source of the First World War. This paper analyses the previously unresearched nature and purposes of German poems found in civilian internment camp newspapers in Britain and the Isle of Man between 1915 and 1918. It looks at the specific themes of national and other identities, namely heroism, victimhood, and informal communities. Through an in-depth textual analysis, it argues that the poems functioned as a therapeutic tool to vent extreme emotions, defuse problems, and comment on discourses present in the camps themselves. They helped to reassure the internees in their identity as inmates as well as to voice and combat their struggles.

Evocations of Nekrasov’s trench prose in Elena Rzhevskaya’s novellas

The article examines the unique characteristics of E. Rzhevskaya’s prose. In 1941–1945, Rzhevskaya was an army interpreter from German. In her analysis of Rzhevskaya’s biography and literary output, S. Perevalova shows the assimilation of the writer’s wartime experience in her oeuvre, which simultaneously follows the patterns of ‘lieutenant prose,’ typified by novellas of V. Nekrasov, Y. Bondarev and other contemporaries of Rzhevskaya’s, and the tradition of Russian classical writers of the 19th c. and the Silver Age. The first work of ‘lieutenant prose’ that invokes the classical tradition was V. Nekrasov’s In the Trenches of Stalingrad [V okopakh Stalingrada], a novella strongly defined by humanism and ties to classical Russian war prose. The author names Nekrasov as well as Lermontov and Blok as influences on Rzhevskaya’s creative method, her affinity with the two poets made stronger by their translations of German poetry which earned the status of classics. Thanks to her interest in Blok and Lermontov, a writer Rzhevskaya became acquainted with world culture, where German literature has long been prominently represented.

THE POEM “SONG ABOUT THE REFRACTOR”: SCIENTIFIC HUMOR IN THE CONTEXT OF RELATIONS BETWEEN RUSSIAN AND GERMAN SCIENTISTS AT THE TURN OF THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURIES

The history of science is intended to study not only the history of discoveries, hypotheses and methodology, but also human connections, which sometimes influence the formation and development of scientific knowledge no less than articles and books. Ephemerides of various kinds are particularly difficult to observe and study: topical hints understood only in a narrow circle, various statements on a subject that may be forgotten after the passage of time, a way of joking that has long since lost its relevance - all that is woven into the fabric of life, including scientific one, and without which it is impossible to imagine people who did science. At the center of the article is a poetic text found in the archive of the remarkable Russian astronomer V.K. Tserasky, who headed the Astronomical Observatory of Moscow University at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries and put a lot of effort into its construction. The humorous work “Song about the Refractor” (1898) by the Berlin student Benno Messow is one of such samples of humor, which can shed light on the nature of scientific contacts between scholars from different countries. The poem is a paraphrase of Friedrich Schiller’s famous “Song of the Bell”, deeply rooted in the tradition of German poetry. Meanwhile, the parodic “song” was presented to V.K. Tserasky, who, according to the presenter’s thought, was able to appreciate the subtlety of the joke. The construction of a refractor in the Moscow observatory seemed an excellent occasion to reuse the text dedicated to the completion of the same device in the Potsdam Astrophysical Observatory. This work is a testimony both to the scientists’ penchant for humor and to the versatile scientific and friendly ties between scholars and engineers of Russia and Germany at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The article examines Messow’s poem, some details of his biography and the alleged circumstances of the song’s transfer to V.K. Tserasky.

Autor und Subjekt im lyrischen Gedicht: Rezension und Neukonzeption einer Theorie der lyrischen Persona

Autor und Subjekt im lyrischen Gedicht: Rezension und Neukonzeption einer Theorie der lyrischen Persona

Evidentialität in autochthonen altgermanischen Schriftdenkmälern im Vergleich zur deutschen Gegenwartssprache

Abstract The paper presents a diachronically based concept of the evidential function in the language. It is argued for a specific discourse evidentiality of the oldest autochthonic German poetry which encoded not epistemic interpretations of outer sources of information, but rather a strong guarantee for the truth of reported events. The origins of this kind of evidentiality can be found both in ontogenesis of a given language, e. g. language acquisition, and in its phylogenesis.

Stabreimende Wortpaare in der deutschen Lyrik des späten Mittelalters

Abstract A valuable collection of late medieval German poetry contains a number of known and new alliterating word-pairs, here surveyed and analyzed for the first time. While reaching beyond the medieval German period covered by earlier studies, it helps complete the survey of German literature approaching the mid-thirteenth century, and provides evidence up until circa 1500.

The beginnings of modern Czech poetry as reflected in journal reviews

The paper considers how critical reviews in Central European journals could contribute to the formation of modern Czech poetry at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries and in the first two decades of the 19th century, until the disputes around 1817 about prosody and poetic autonomy in general significantly affected its discourse. It places these mostly anonymous reviews within the broader framework of reviews of poetry in German and Czech from the Bohemian Lands, especially those in the major review journals (Jenaische allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung, Leipziger Literatur- Zeitung, Annalen der österreichischen Literatur, etc.), in which Bohemian and Moravian contributors also found a place, given the obstacles to the development of domestic periodicals. It argues that this criticism had discussed the constitution of a modern authorial type, which was, however, especially in domestic Bohemian and Moravian post-revolutionary conditions strongly concentrated on general social benefit of literature. Early Czech-language poets of Antonín Jaroslav Puchmajer’s circle asserted themselves with a similar social emphasis in self-criticism in the Viennese Annalen, taking into account the still partly scholarly nature of period criticism and representative values of Czech as a kingdom’s language. Characteristically of this scholarly-publicist criticism in contemporary Central Europe, most attention was paid to works such as Joseph Müller’s translation of The Tale of Igor’s Campaign, Meinert’s Der Fylgie or The Manuscript of Dvůr Králové, that could “shed light” on the former role of poetry for nations and open up ways for its modern authors (see similar German discussions on the Nibelungenlied among emerging national philologists and poets).

Rhyme in dróttkvætt, from Old Germanic Inheritance to Contemporary Poetic Ecology II: Rhyme as an Inherited Device of Old Germanic Verse

This paper is the second in a three-part series on the distinctive type of rhyme in the Old Norse dróttkvætt meter, argued to have emerged through the metricalization of uses of rhyme within a short line found across Old Germanic poetries. Whereas the first paper outlined the argument and its background, this paper explores uses of rhyme in Old Germanic poetries other than Old Norse. Rhyme involving the stressed syllable or word stem irrespective of subsequent syllables is shown to be a device of these poetic systems. Especially in Old English, such rhyme is used to support and reinforce the basic meter and may even fill a metrical function in the place of additional alliteration. The type of rhyme is argued to be an inherited feature of the poetic system, an argument also supported by the metricalized use of rhyme in Old Norse dróttkvætt poetry. Because some theories of the Old Germanic poetic form require viewing rhyme as competing and interfering with its rhythm, the rhymecompatible model used here is outlined.

Christian Felix Weiße’s Poetry in Latvian and Estonian Literature

The article analyzes the translations of Christian Felix Weiße’s poems in Latvian and Estonian within the context of cultural transfer during the age of Enlightenment. Translations of Weiße’s poems were of great significance because they paved the way for the emergence of secular poetry in both languages. First translations appeared in the 1770s, and others followed in the next decades. While the first Latvian translations were connected to the popular enlightenment efforts of Baltic German pastor Gotthard Friedrich Stender and addressed to the peasant readers, the first Estonian translations were written in the context of experiments with the language and addressed to the Baltic German intellectual elite. First translations that were addressed to Estonian peasants appeared in the early 19th century. The frame of reference of the poems was transformed when they were addressed to peasant reading public: they acquired didactic meaning. At the same time, these translations demonstrated the poetic possibilities of Estonian and Latvian languages. The analysis as a case study reveals the multifaceted influence of German poetry on Estonian and Latvian literary cultures.

The Seasons by James Thomson and the Baltic German Poetry about the Seasons in the Era of Baltic Enlightenment

Since 2016 one of my research topics has been the Baltic German reception of English poetry through the lens of cultural historical book collections in Estonia. One of my findings has been that James Thomson’s The Seasons belonged among the most often received works of English poetry by Baltic Germans in Estonia, after James Macpherson’s Poems of Ossian and John Milton’s Paradise Lost and followed by Edward Young’s Night-Thoughts. (Kaur 2018: 375) Except for Milton’s, these works are almost unknown to modern Estonian readers. Therefore a few words to introduce Thomson and his famous work should be said.
 James Thomson (1700–1748) was an 18th century Scottish poet and playwright. Son of a Presbyterian minister, he studied at the College of Edinburgh to become a minister (1715–1719). However, very soon he found that preaching was not his calling and moved in 1725 to London to commit himself to literary work. There he created his poetic tetralogy in blank verse Winter (first published in 1726), Summer (1727), Spring (1728) and Autumn, which appeared together under the title The Seasons in 1730 (revised version in 1744). Enthusiastic, patriotic and full of love for flora, fauna, people, landscapes and everchanging weather conditions of his surroundings, but also of the wider world, it was received with great admiration by his British compatriots. But not only them: a new fresh interest in nature and especially in the phenomenon of the seasons as well the wish to describe and express them through poetry and other artistic means can be traced in Europe. Some years before Thomson the famous Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi had created his violin concerto The Four Seasons (1718) and a German poet and senator from the city of Hamburg, Barthold Hinrich Brockes, had started to publish his series Irdisches Vergnügen in Gott (Earthly Delight in God) (1721–1748) in which he meticulously described many objects from and views of nature as God’s creations, inspired by English and Dutch physical theology.

„Eine verschollen geglaubte Textsammlung ruft die Vergangenheit auf“1: Rezension zu: die bewegung der antillen unter der schädeldecke. junge rumäniendeutsche lyrik zwischen 1975 und 1980. Eine (historische) Anthologie herausgegeben von Walter Fromm, 1. Auflage, Ludwigsburg: Pop Verlag 2022. Erweiterte, kritische Neuauflage 2022 mit einem einleitenden Essay von Prof. Dr. Waldemar Fromm und einer soziokulturellen Kontextualisierung von Prof. Dr. Anton Sterbling. Reihe

Abstract The present text is dedicated to an anthology of German poetry from Romania, which was collected in 1980 but could not be published during the communist dictatorship and was subsequently published in 2022 to great success on the German book market. The anthology illustrates the fact that a modern movement parallel to the one in Germany emerged within the insular German-language literature in Romania, developing a set of very distinct particularities.

AMPLIFICATION AS A MEANS OF INTENSIFYING POETIC EXPRESSIVENESS OF SPEECH

Purpose. This article is devoted to the consideration of amplification as an expressive means of stylistic syntax in the texts of the German Romantics of the 19th century. The author aims to describe various types of enumeration as the main means of amplification, taking into account the nature of the rhythmic expressiveness of a simple sentence and to reveal the entire stylistic potential of enumerative series.
 Methods or methodology of the work. The basis of the research is formed by the continuous sampling method in the selection of practical material as well as the method of descriptive linguo-stylistic analysis.
 Results. The analysis showed that amplification is a significant means of enhancing the emotional effectiveness of the language of romantic poets. By nominative and verbal enumeration, the effect of monotony, despondency, pressure, elevation, joy and hope is achieved. A special rhythmization of the sentence is created due to the enumerative intonation and rhythm. Along with a certain syntactic uniformity and consistency, there is a dismemberment of a homogeneous enumerative series, which creates a special kind of rhythmic expressiveness.
 Practical implications. The results of the research can be used at the lessons of Stylistics of the German Language, Text Interpretation, in seminars on the study of features of the language of German poetry.

Zur Rolle der Silbenquantität in der mittelhochdeutschen Metrik

Abstract The article illustrates and justifies the role of syllable weight for the MHG verse. It counters a 2021 paper by A. Estis, who fundamentally questions the relevance of syllable weight for MHG metrics. The argumentation of the riposte relies on text-analytical findings, methodological aspects (heuristics), the history of the German verse in late medieval and early modern times, last but not least on historical testimonies, namely by Heinrich von Hesler and Nikolaus von Jeroschin. The article concludes with a reformulation of basic analytical principles of MHG metrics, thus trying to forestall some misunderstandings possibly provoked by the traditional terminology of A. Heusler.

Nizarorustu: A Textual Analysis of the Battle of Niså

Nizarorustu: A Textual Analysis of the Battle of Niså

Поетична збірка Пауля Целана «Мак і пам’ять»: історія літературного прориву

The article under studies traces the poetic and publishing genesis of Paul Celan’s collection of poetry “Poppy and Destiny”. The latter collection has made its way under extremely hard circumstances; however, it has eventually become a real literary breakthrough and the young author’s greatest poetic success. On the other hand, at first the poet published large collections of his texts in renowned German-language press (“Plan”, “Die Tat”). Later, he tried many times to carry out his literary debut in the form of a book. The early stages of “Poppy and Destiny” include several handwritten text collections (“Typoscript”, 1944; “Manuscript”, 1945), in which the young author prepared and gradually implemented the concept of his collection. The culmination of this hard work was the Viennese collection “The Sand from the Urns” (1948), which Celan soon destroyed due to numerous typographical errors. Nevertheless, he never rejected it, yet he conscientiously revised the poems, including a good half of them into the manuscript of the new collection “Poppy and Memory”. At a meeting of the literary “Group 47” in Niedorf (1952), he finally managed to get in touch with the Stuttgart publishing house “Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt”, which regarded his collection as an innovation in post-war German poetry, as well as promptly published it on Christmas Eve of 1952. The publication of the collection soon became a literary sensation and laid the cornerstone of the poet’s later fame in the German and European cultural space.

Поетична збірка Пауля Целана «Мак і пам’ять»: історія літературного прориву

The article under studies traces the poetic and publishing genesis of Paul Celan’s collection of poetry “Poppy and Destiny”. The latter collection has made its way under extremely hard circumstances; however, it has eventually become a real literary breakthrough and the young author’s greatest poetic success. On the other hand, at first the poet published large collections of his texts in renowned German-language press (“Plan”, “Die Tat”). Later, he tried many times to carry out his literary debut in the form of a book. The early stages of “Poppy and Destiny” include several handwritten text collections (“Typoscript”, 1944; “Manuscript”, 1945), in which the young author prepared and gradually implemented the concept of his collection. The culmination of this hard work was the Viennese collection “The Sand from the Urns” (1948), which Celan soon destroyed due to numerous typographical errors. Nevertheless, he never rejected it, yet he conscientiously revised the poems, including a good half of them into the manuscript of the new collection “Poppy and Memory”. At a meeting of the literary “Group 47” in Niedorf (1952), he finally managed to get in touch with the Stuttgart publishing house “Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt”, which regarded his collection as an innovation in post-war German poetry, as well as promptly published it on Christmas Eve of 1952. The publication of the collection soon became a literary sensation and laid the cornerstone of the poet’s later fame in the German and European cultural space.

“How we can make use of any verse in common life”: the place and function of early modern poetry in literary culture

ABSTRACT From the sixteenth century onwards, those education institutions that were humanistic by rhetoric turned to a basic education in poetry, teaching the use of verse in everyday life. Initially, this was related to ancient verse and its meaning, then was transferred to Neo-Latin poetry and to German (vernacular) verse, thereby transforming literary culture. On this basis, the role of poetry in literary culture in the Baltics is shown using three examples: the late humanistic literary culture of Riga in the 1580s, mainly in Latin; the literary culture in Reval (Tallinn) around fifty years later, much more influenced by German-language poetry; and finally, German poems in love letters of that time, showing the application and function of verse in the private space.

Lyrical miniatures by Grigory Petnikov: historical and cultural context

Grigory Nikolaevich Petnikov (1894-1971) was a Russian and Ukrainian poet, translator, publisher. He actively published as a poet during the futuristic period (1913-1922), when he joined the literary avant-garde, was the Second Chairman of the Globe and one of the founders of the Kharkov publishing house "Liren". Since the mid-20s, Grigory Petnikov has been mainly engaged in translations and is still better known as a translator of myths of Ancient Greece, fairy tales of the brothers Grimm, Ukrainian and Belarusian folk tales, poems by Taras Shevchenko, prose by Ivan Franko, Marko Vovchok, German poetry. The second period of Grigory Petnikov's poetic creativity began with the time of the thaw and lasted until the last years of the poet's life. In 1958, Petnikov moved to the Crimea, wrote a lot and actively published as a poet. The article attempts to analyze the late poems-miniatures of Grigory Petnikov from his last lifetime collection "Lyrics", published in 1969. Special attention is paid to the genre and style features of Petnikov's lyrical miniatures, the cultural and historical context of the poems; an attempt is made to determine whether the poems from the collection "Lyrics" belong to the poetic trends and trends in the lyrics of the Silver Age.

THE SINS OF THE FATHERS: LEONARD FORSTER'S REPLY TO AN EARLY CRITIC OF THE PENGUIN BOOK OF GERMAN VERSE1

ABSTRACTThis essay follows‐up on a reminiscence written by Leonard Forster for GLL in 1988. Forster was the editor of The Penguin Book of German Verse, first published in 1957. The anthology was intended for a post‐war British readership, particularly in schools, that seemed, despite everything, to have preserved an affectionate admiration for German poetry. Forster's selections often appear to have served as deliberate correctives to the ideological preferences of the previous generation's National Socialist critics, some of which had also resonated with several British Germanists. Shortly after publication, Forster received a letter from ‘Bernward Michaelsen’, who objected at great (though courteous) length to many of the anthology's inclusions. Forster and fellow German scholar S. H. Steinberg judged the writer to be an elderly German schoolteacher whose conservative literary taste had been formed after World War I. Forster's equally courteous and detailed response to Michaelsen's criticisms received no answer. What they did not know (although Steinberg came close to guessing) was that Michaelsen was actually Bernward Vesper, the eighteen‐year‐old son of Will Vesper, a notorious National Socialist editor and poet. Bernward's political trajectory from extreme right to left after his father's death was not unique for his generation but, unknown to Forster in 1988, had long since ended in tragedy.

Специфика интертекстуальных отношений как фактор риска в возникновении коммуникативной неудачи (на примере поэтических текстов современного немецкоязычного интернет-дискурса)

The article considers the phenomenon of intertextuality as a textual category. The non-recognition of intertextuality can lead to communication failure in dialogic, when the recipient attempts to enter the communicative intention of the sender, as well as at the time of reading, when the recipient is decoding and analyzing the information received. The relevance of the research is determined by the importance of the more detailed study of such means of explication of intertextual connections as allusion and precedent phenomena within the modern German poetry Internet discourse.
 The aim of research is to identify the means of intertextuality actualization, that are the causes of communication failure in the interpretation of the modern German texts. 
 Methodology and research methods. The research work used methods of systematization and generalization of the scientific material, a descriptive-analytical method, the method of lingual-stylistic analysis of the text. 
 Results. The article focuses on the polyphony of the German poetry texts, that is expressed in the incorporation of literary and cultural-specific codes. Precedent phenomena and allusions are the sources of communication failures in German poetry discourse and they serve as preferential ways of building intertextual connections in German poems. The author recommends to increase the levels of linguistic and general cultural competence in order to minimize the communicative dissonance, that is a result of the non-recognition of intertextuality.
 Scientific novelty lies in the study of the specifics of communication failures on the example of modern German poetry discourse.
 The practical significance is determined by the possibility of using the obtained scientific results in special university basic courses on translation theory, cognitive linguistics, stylistics and culture of speech, linguo-stylistic interpretation of the text.