{"title":"LOST AT SEA: MARITIME MODERNITY AND THE NEGOTIATION OF IDENTITY IN THEODOR STORM'S ‘HANS UND HEINZ KIRCH’","authors":"Linda Karlsson Hammarfelt","doi":"10.1111/glal.12424","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article explores the depiction of the sailor and the conflict between bourgeois life and its fluid ‘other’ in Theodor Storm's novella ‘Hans und Heinz Kirch’ (1883). The analysis brings together spatial theory, in particular Deleuze and Guattari's understanding of ‘smooth’ and ‘striated’ spaces, and reception aesthetics. Next to the ‘smooth’, fluid border of the ocean, the article identifies other in-between areas which play a central role in the novella as spheres of negotiating story and identity: the sailor's skin as the border between self and other; and the omissions of language and narration. It argues that the many ‘Leerstellen’ of the text correspond to the openness of the sea and open up to a ‘travelling’ reading. Readers are invited to actively explore the open spaces and ambiguities of the text and thus contribute to the production of meaning. Placing Storm's novella in the context of maritime modernity and regarding correspondences between the narrative discourse and the conflict between ‘smooth’ and ‘striated’ space, this article offers a new perspective on Storm.</p>","PeriodicalId":54012,"journal":{"name":"GERMAN LIFE AND LETTERS","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2024-08-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/glal.12424","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"GERMAN LIFE AND LETTERS","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/glal.12424","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LITERATURE, GERMAN, DUTCH, SCANDINAVIAN","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This article explores the depiction of the sailor and the conflict between bourgeois life and its fluid ‘other’ in Theodor Storm's novella ‘Hans und Heinz Kirch’ (1883). The analysis brings together spatial theory, in particular Deleuze and Guattari's understanding of ‘smooth’ and ‘striated’ spaces, and reception aesthetics. Next to the ‘smooth’, fluid border of the ocean, the article identifies other in-between areas which play a central role in the novella as spheres of negotiating story and identity: the sailor's skin as the border between self and other; and the omissions of language and narration. It argues that the many ‘Leerstellen’ of the text correspond to the openness of the sea and open up to a ‘travelling’ reading. Readers are invited to actively explore the open spaces and ambiguities of the text and thus contribute to the production of meaning. Placing Storm's novella in the context of maritime modernity and regarding correspondences between the narrative discourse and the conflict between ‘smooth’ and ‘striated’ space, this article offers a new perspective on Storm.
期刊介绍:
- German Life and Letters was founded in 1936 by the distinguished British Germanist L.A. Willoughby and the publisher Basil Blackwell. In its first number the journal described its aim as "engagement with German culture in its widest aspects: its history, literature, religion, music, art; with German life in general". German LIfe and Letters has continued over the decades to observe its founding principles of providing an international and interdisciplinary forum for scholarly analysis of German culture past and present. The journal appears four times a year, and a typical number contains around eight articles of between six and eight thousand words each.