Current Trends in Narratology

Abstract

Borders: Interracial Relationships in English Colonial Fiction”, Brigitte Glaser scrutinizes colonial literature set in South Asia and South East Asia with regard to its representations of interracial relationships. She first presents an overview of the relevant socio-cultural and historical background; in a second step, she zooms in on recurring scenarios and character constellations and analyzes male European protagonists who engage in interracial relationships out of loneliness or because of the irresistible exotic lure of the native women as well as female European characters who are often metaphorically linked to the nation. Laurie R. Cohen investigates two examples from the early 20th century, a caricature of Bertha von Suttner and a conflict within the League of German Women’s Societies on solidarity and patriotism, in order to reveal how women’s political strivings have been perceived. Cohen draws attention to the “abolitionist presence” (227) in both the women’s and the peace movement and negotiates the role of feminists and feminist pacifists as marginalized ‘Others’ in the public domain. Rüdiger Ahrens takes the reader to a quite different setting and context as he examines J. M. Coetzee’s novels Foe (1986) and Disgrace (1999) with an eye to the “ethical norms and ethnic frictions” – as the title of his essay promises. He focuses on characters “who live in the narrow zone of two worlds and two cultures” (241) as he situates both texts within their South African socio-cultural framework and reads them as rewritings of canonical texts, Daniel Defoe’s The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1719) and John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress (1678) respectively. Lastly, Andrea Strolz critically examines Dionne Brand’s At the Full and Change of the Moon (1999) regarding its engagement with the cultural memory of the Middle Passage. Strolz specifically discusses how Brand presents the “history of the Middle Passage as a heterotopian site” (258). Racism, Slavery, and Literature comprises some convincing, well-argued, and thought-provoking contributions, but the collection in total lacks continuity, a solid framework, and in-depth analyses. The range of topics covered and the diverse perspectives and various subject-matters included attest to the great ambition behind the project. This volume, however, does not fully live up to this ambition, even though it offers a potpourri of ideas and interesting impulses for future transnational and interdisciplinary research on issues such as slavery, racism, ethnicity, and the nation.