Der Tagesspiegel asked several German Literature scholars to name their favorite novels (Das sind die Lieblingsromane der Germanisten). So I want to compare their choices to my list of The Ten Greatest German Novels: How many of their choices were also on my list?
1) Irmela Marei Krüger-Fürhoff (FU Berlin): Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: Die Wahlverwandtschaften
Okay, I picked Goethe's earlier Die Leiden des jungen Werther since it was THE seminal Sturm und Drang work and had such an impact with young people in Germany and beyond. I can agree with Professor Krüger-Fürhoff that Die Wahlverwandtschaften is a more interesting work of fiction and deserves re-reading.
2) Annie Ring, (University College London): Wolfgang Hilbig: Das Provisorium
Very interesting choice. Hilbig was the most talented writer to come out of the DDR and would certainly be high on my list of great postwar German novelists. See my reviews of "Ich" and Sleep of the Righteous.
3) Peter-André Alt (FU Berlin): Franz Kafka: Der Process.
Of course – very logical choice. I am more partial to Kafka's stories, but Der Process is his greatest novel, and belongs on anyone's list of the greatest novels of the 20th century. Professor Alt writes:
"Ist K. schuldig, weil er an nichts glaubt? Weil er seine Sexualität verdrängt? Oder verhaftet man ihn als Normalbürger, der in einem Terrorstaat ohne humanes Rechtssystem lebt? Seit fast hundert Jahren haben die Interpreten nahezu sämtliche Weltanschauungen der Moderne in Kafkas Roman projiziert. Sie haben ihn dadurch weder erklären noch entzaubern können. Seine Rätsel bleiben, sie machen ihn für jede neue Lesergeneration neu anziehend und geheimnisvoll. Vermutlich liegt seine besondere Aura darin, dass er wie unsere Träume funktioniert. Er erzählt aus der Welt des Unbewussten, ohne uns näher zu erklären, was sie bedeutet."
("Is K. guilty because he doesn't believe in anything? Because he's repressed his sexuality? Or was he simply arrested as your average citizen who lives in a terror state without a humane legal system? For nearly 100 years interpreters have projected practically every belief system of modernity onto Kafka's novel. But they have neither explained or de-mystified him. He remains an enigma; this makes him attractive and secretive for every new generation of readers. Presumably his special aura exists because he functions like our dreams. He writes from the realm of the unconscious without telling us what it means.")
4) Ulrike Vedder (Humboldt-Universität): Choderlos de Laclos: Les Liaisons dangereuses
A German Literary scholar choosing a French work as her favorite? Sad.
5) Daniel Bowles (Boston College): Thomas Bernhard: Wittgensteins Neffe
I haven't read this novel, but have always found Thomas Bernhard too misanthropic for my taste. Willing to try again, though, so this will go on my reading list.
6) Alice Stasková (Universität Jena): Hermann Broch: Die Schlafwandler
Yes! Broch's trilogy is a neglected masterpiece that stands beside the novels of James Joyce and Marcel Proust.
Professor Stasková writes:
"Der Roman zeigt, was die Literatur ist. Denn er vollzieht an sich selbst, was er verhandelt. Sein Thema ist nichts Geringeres als die Geschichte Europas, und das dargestellte Problem ist das Verhältnis des Individuums zu dieser Geschichte. Und da es sich um die Jahrzehnte bis zum Ende des Ersten Weltkriegs handelt, vollzieht der Roman an sich selbst den Zerfall – jenen der abendländischen Kultur, ihrer Werte und des Individuums."
("The novel shows what literature is. For it fulfills itself that which it depicts. Its theme is nothing less than the history of Europe, and it deals with the problematic of the individual's relation to this history. And, since it covers the decades up to the end of the First World War it contains within itself the breakdown- of Western civilization, its values and of the individual.")
And this:
Brochs Roman macht süchtig nach Romanen – und nach der nie zu erlangenden Erkenntnis, die uns die Literatur verspricht.
"süchtig nach Romanen" – "Addicted to novels." Indeed. I'm ready for my next fix.
