Reviews 9oo post-war German-language novella, drawing onLacan,Barthes, Culler, deMan, Ricur, andothers, inorder, inhiswords, todemonstrate hisintroductory premise that 'the accentuation ofthe metaphoric potential ofnovellas and/or short stories is concomitant with, andmaybeengendered bythegreater succinctness andlimited scopeoftheshorter text's metonymic foundation'. Basically, then, novellas 'work' because they areshort andsuggestive. Yetherein liesthemajor flaw ofthepresent study: the volume isitself neither concise northought-provoking. Itstretches to280 pages ofdense, theory-laden prose which alltoooften verges orl incomprehensibility. Twotheoretical chapters introduce Hochhuth's Atlantik-J\/¢ovelle andDieBerliner Antigone, Durrenmatt's Der Auftrag andDerSturz, andWalser's Ein fiehendes Pferd and ffenseits der Liebe. The first chapter, on 'contemporary poetics', is cryptic in its presentation ofmodern critical theory and fallsintothetrapofimitating the turgidity ofsome ofthe authors itreviews. Thesecond chapter, which deals with the 'theory ofthenovella', isanimprovement. Yetitisheavily reliant onother people's work, overburdened with quotation, andlacking in direction. A debateon the American short story, furthermore, appears outofplace.Certainly Plouffie seems unable tomake the connection backtohisGerman theme. Thesections dealing with the novellas byHochhuth, Durrenmatt andWalser are sometimes impressive fortheir scattered insights. As elsewhere in thisvolume, however, style iseverything: the bookistoohard toread.Long, complex sentences, abstruse vocabulary and syntax, alongwitha lackofdirection, meanthatthe author's occasional originality isswamped. Atendency towards over-interpretation (for Plouffie, a 'zerfetzter Hut'suggests a 'zerfetzter Hoch'huth' irritated bythe truncation of TheDeputy foritsBroadway premiere) and an inclination to see intertextuality lurking in every corner ofa textare equallyobscuring. These reservations apply toeachofthe sections dealing with individual authors andtexts. In summary, Plouffie's volume fails to impress. Thisis unfortunate given the obvious energy, investment andcommitment ofitsauthor. Themajor problems are style, lackofclarity, anda proclivity for over-interpretation. Irritating factual errors donot help: Martin Swales, for example, iscited asan'American author'! Thisbook will notchange thewaywelookatthepost-war German novella. Norwill readers maketheeffiort toextract theauthor's insights intoindividual authors andtexts from the turgid prose inwhich they areembedded. UNIVERSITY OFLEEDS STUART TABERNER IheGerman Bildungsroman: Incest and Inheritance. BYMICHAEL MINDEN. (Cambridge Studiesin German) Cambridge, New York,and Melbourne: Cambridge UniversityPress. I997. Xi+29Ipp. £4° This important and original bookhas, in a way,takentheBildung out of Bildungsroman. Arguing that thefundamental structure ofkey examples ofthegenre is circular, notlinear, MichaelMindenconvincingly elaborates a theory ofthe centrality ofcomplementary patterns ofincest/desire andinheritance, innovels which areaboutsubjectivity andtheaesthetic. In whathe acknowledges tobe 'masculine works' headdresses andexplains issues ofgender andother problematic aspects oftheworks, without explaining them away.He argues thatthegenre subverts 'received gender definitions' (p.2) bypresenting unmanly heroes, and although Freud's Oedipalmodel isrelevant inthesense that theharmonization of lawwith desire isatstake, thetheme ofrivalry isalienintheBildungsroman with its focus onthe relationship between the individual andthe external world. DrMinden MLR, 96.3, 200I 90I seestheGerman Bildungsroman asa series ofvariations onGoethe's Wilhelm Meisters Lehyahre, towhich hedevotes thefirst offive chapters. Hiscritical accounts ofthe novels examined canstand independently, asreadings ofthe novels, seenasliterary texts, within their intellectual andhistorical contexts. Minden locates the Lehyahre ata point ofhistorical andliterary convergence, with itscombination ofhighandlowartinan agewhentheprivileged nobility and commercially active middle classwere coming closer together. Byreference tothe Hamlet production, heshows Goethe's noveltobe theantithesis ofShakespeare's exploration ofsubjective interiority. The Lehyahre rewrites thestory ofpaternal inheritance, viatheironic narrative voice, asanobjective expression ofsubjectivity inauthoritative aesthetic form. Creating a series ofwomen tostructure thework andtoreflect ideal,unfragmented being, Goethe usesintertextuality tohighlight thematter ofliterary authority, andshifts Wilhelm from subjectivity totypicality through hisplaying oftheroleofHamlet, thusdelivering a resolution which mediates between therealandtheideal.Thephilosophical ideaoftheaesthetic, by accommodating objectivity andsubjectivity together, overcomes the dichotomies of theageandresists the'atomising tendencies ofscientific thought' (p. 23).In his discussion oftheintractable Mignon problem, Minden highlights theexpressive possibilities ofandrogyny asanaspect ofthethematic useofgender, andtentatively suggests that theLehgahre's achievement isnottoeradicate discontinuities, butto makethem visible. Chapter 2 examines Wieland's Geschichte des Agathon, Moritz's Anton Reiser and Holderlin's Hyperion as comparators forGoethe's novelwhich amplify ourunderstanding ofthe context inwhich itwasproduced. InAgathon there is antagonism, rather thanGoethe'sconvergence, between authority and the autobiographical anderotic forces. Wom Jones andXelemaque arepoints ofreference as MindenplotsWieland's transitional position and 'slidefrom education to subjectivity' (p.64) and seekstheunderlying modelsdetermining theshapeof Agathon, whose ironic narrative andblendofpublic andprivate intheinheritance theme point towards the Lehrjahre. Moving ontoKeller's Dergr7ine Heinrich, Minden probes thecloseintertextual relationship with Goethe's novel, interms ofpartial subjectivity andthe relationship between lawanddesire, highlighting theparadox that Keller's female characters represent authorial control and simultaneously represent the male subject's...