EAN: 9781433109348

LITERARY NATIONALISM IN GERMAN AND JAPANESE «GE...

Literary Nationalism in German and Japanese Germanistik traces the convergence of German and
Japanese metaphors for national literary spirit through the academic study of the German
language and literature in Germanistik. Early notions of a spiritual link to the national
literary tradition allowed speakers of German to imagine their unity before the existence of
the modern German state  but the concept for spirit also gained various nuances in the works of
such writers as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe  the Brothers Grimm  E.T.A. Hoffmann  and Hermann
Hesse. Moreover  throughout the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century  scholars
and thinkers increasingly equated literary spirit with the psychology of the German nation.
Against the background of these developments  the slogans of university students who burned
books of so-called un-German spirit in 1933 gained a particularly ominous meaning.
Interestingly  for Japanese contemplating German literature in the late nineteenth century  the
native idea of national literary spirit was one of many concepts that differed from their
German counterparts. However  skilled writers and translators like Mori gai invested old words
with new meanings  and by the 1930s Japanese scholars of Germanistik had not only documented
the discourse on German national literary spirit but also deemed it synonymous with the spirit
of Japan's own tradition.

Aktuelle Preise zur EAN 9781433109348

Produktinformationen zur 9781433109348