Kurz und lang, Spreu und Weizen, Arsch und Mond – Volcnant und Walther

Abstract

Abstract Walther’s von der Vogelweide aggressive stanza against an, otherwise unknown, Volcnant or Wîcman (L 17,25) opens up the lasting tradition of artistic polemics and ›peer-bashing‹ in German Sangspruchdichtung. Henceforth, the agonal rivalry between artists becomes the favourite field of a particularly harsh polemic. The article examines the pioneer’s text with regard to the split (or doubled) role of the singer who adopts two grammatical persons (which seems also to be crucial for Walther’s disputed authorship), to the metaphorical structure and to the discursive as well as generic references of the text. The singer in the text is boasting himself by constructing and simultaneously destructing an aggressively ridiculed counterpart. This, however, is not to be understood in biographical terms, but in genuinely poetological and professional ones: Walther claims his unsurpassed competence (meisterschaft) in all registers and varieties of an art that ranges far from well-tempered courtesy up to the most exquisite scolding. Scharpfer sanc is not an antithesis but a subset of courtly art and poetry.