ABSTRACT This article provides an interpretative analysis of J. W. von Goethe's West–östlicher Divan through the lens of gender poetics. The methodology employs a triangulation approach, juxtaposing selected works by three authors: Hafez Shirazi, Goethe and A. von Platen‐Hallermünde. The objective is to explore how the German authors reimagined Hafez's love lamentations, focusing on their use of archetypal characters: the poet, the indifferent lover and the youthful, attractive cupbearer. The central argument posits that, despite Goethe's proclaimed affinity with Hafez, the West–östlicher Divan presents a conceptualisation of personal relationships that significantly diverges from Hafez's lyrical themes. Additionally, the article highlights didactic shifts in character functions and a satirical, even parodic, distortion of the Quranic narrative of Yusuf and Zulaikha. In contrast to Goethe, Platen's imitative love lyrics more faithfully replicate Hafez's narrative and stylistic motifs within a German cultural context.
Abstract By bringing Michael Rothberg's notion of the ‘implicated subject’ into conversation with feminist scholarship, this article examines Antje Rávik Strubel's Blaue Frau , a novel that addresses both structural violence and specific instances of sexualised violence in a European context. While the victim and main character, a young woman from the Czech Republic, ultimately regains a degree of agency, the novel also points at systemic inequities that derail the legal prosecution of the perpetrator. Drawing on the concept of implication, the analysis shows how the novel complicates power relations beyond neat binaries of East/West and masculine/feminine. It does so by examining characters who cannot be captured in the perpetrator/victim binary but who are nevertheless implicated in the injustices portrayed in Blaue Frau . The article concludes by exploring the metafictional and autofictional dimensions of the titular figure of the blue woman, and by maintaining that both dimensions reflect on the author's implication in the novel she writes. As will be argued throughout, Strubel's Blaue Frau can be read both literally — with a primary focus on individual characters — and figuratively, as an allegory for complex power relations in contemporary Europe.
ABSTRACT Der Beitrag erzählt die Geschichte der Entdeckung und Aufwertung des Jiddischen unter deutschsprachigen Schriftstellerinnen und Schriftstellern. Hatte die zunächst als Judendeutsch, Mauscheln oder Jargon bezeichnete Sprache in literarischen Texten des 19. Jahrhunderts vornehmlich eine mimetische Funktion, in der Regel wie bei Gustav Freytag in diskriminierender Absicht, kam es im Ersten Weltkrieg zu einer Neubewertung. Die jüdische Kultur in den vom Kaiserreich besetzten russischen Gebieten war nunmehr in deutschen Medien präsent. Neben der Zunahme des Antisemitismus lässt sich zugleich eine Faszination für das als authentisch wahrgenommene, weil nicht assimilierte ostjüdische Leben beobachten, die sich auch auf die ostjiddische Sprache erstreckte. Trotz der vielen von ihr ausgehenden Repressalien übte die Besatzungsmacht eine tolerante Sprachpolitik aus, die von einem auch schulpolitisch aufschlussreichen Diskurs begleitet wurde. Der für die deutsche Zensur in Ober Ost tätige Schriftsteller Arnold Zweig trug wesentlich zur Aufwertung ostjüdischer Kultur bei, die künstlerisch etwa von Marc Chagall gestaltet wurde. An Else Lasker‐Schülers Beziehung zu dem jiddisch schreibenden Dichter Abraham Stenzel (hebr. , Transliteration: Avrom Noḥem Stencl), unmittelbar im Vorfeld der in Berlin 1925 gegründeten YIVO (Yidisher visnshaftlekher institut), wird die neue Einstellung in der deutschen Literatur gegenüber dem Jiddischen ablesbar. Ihr Gedicht „Abraham Stenzel“ bringt die neuen und einmaligen Möglichkeiten der deutsch‐jiddischen Mehrsprachigkeit zum Ausdruck.
ABSTRACT This article examines the pedagogical potential of young adult literature about East Germany to help readers reflect on the legacies of authoritarian rule and questions of responsibility, accountability and agency. Drawing on Michael Rothberg's concept of the implicated subject, I argue that young adult literature exploring implication offers crucial frameworks for strengthening democratic consciousness. While much young adult literature about the GDR perpetuates problematic victim/perpetrator binaries that obscure the complex realities of life under authoritarianism, Dorit Linke's Jenseits der blauen Grenze demonstrates an alternative approach. Through analysis of Linke's sophisticated narrative techniques, including her use of fragmented storytelling and montage, I show how the novel positions readers as active interpreters who must recognise patterns of complicity and implication in everyday social relations. Rather than presenting clear‐cut heroes and villains, Linke reveals how ordinary people become entangled in systems of power through accommodation, silence and their positioning within social structures that sustain authoritarian rule. This nuanced exploration of implication proves especially relevant for contemporary Germany, where young people face rising authoritarianism and need tools for understanding how individual choices shape political systems and democratic institutions.
ABSTRACT This article explores how Abbas Khider's 2016 novel Ohrfeige reckons with global violence against refugees by employing formal and rhetorical techniques to implicate readers in such violence. Bringing Michael Rothberg's concept of ‘the implicated subject’ — a figure who is neither victim nor perpetrator but rather enables or benefits from regimes of violence — into conversation with narrative theory and formalist criticism, the article conceptualises what I call an implicated reader , a term that designates an implied reader who is implicated in the violent events and structures represented in the given text. My analytical framework of the implicated reader illuminates how Khider constructs his novel to address and challenge the implied German reader. In particular, I examine here how Khider employs formal ‘Sie’ second‐person address, among other literary techniques, to invite the reader to identify with a German state asylum officer who dehumanises and disregards refugee lives. The article ultimately suggests that rather than facilitating the reader's identification and empathy with victimised subjects, some works of literature, including Khider's novel, challenge injustice and provoke political responsibility by prompting readers to imagine themselves in the position of someone who contributes to rather than suffers from political violence.
