Raum. Ort. Topografien der Posener Heimatliteratur

Abstract

Abstract The literature of the Eastern March is strictly local. A collection of several dozen German-language novels and stories from the circle of ‘Ostmarkenliteratur’ (literature of the Eastern March), which on a scale unknown before and afterwards sends the reader back to this specific region, shows how important the Poznań Province had become on the verge of the 19th century. Geographical and topographic information in the creative output of writers constitute its ‘verbal map’. Inspired by Barbara Piatti’s interpretative approach, I will attempt to answer key questions regarding the circumstances and conditions that are conductive to locating the plot of literary works in specific spaces and places, and to interpret the experience of space recorded in the literature of the Eastern March by means of this map.