Anglo German Interactions In The Literature Of The 1890s

This is a study of what the main 'aesthetic' writers of late nineteenth-century Britain made of German literature, and of how Germany in turn reacted to them. The impact of Anglo-Scottish art nouveau in fin-de-siecle Austria and Germany made it predictable that Keats, Pater and Rossetti, among others, would be well received, but no one could have known in advance that by the time of their deaths Swinburne and Wilde would be more highly regarded in germany that in Britain. Bridgwater's lucid and thoroughly documented study casts new light on the the central cultural issues of hte day, including ideas of mortality, truth, and subjectivism in art, comparing Pater and Wilde with Nietzche, and George Moore, that chameleon of the decadent nineties, with Schopenhauer. Patrick Bridgwater, Emeritus Professor of German in the University of Durham, is known for his books on Anglo-German literary relations, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Kafka and Expressionism.

"This is a study of what the main ""aesthetic"" writers of late 19th-century Britain made of German literature, and of how Germany in turn reacted to them. The impact of Anglo-Scottish art nouveau in fin-de-siecle Austria and Germany made it predictable that Keats, Pater and Rossetti, among others, would be well received, but no one could have known in advance that by the time of their deaths, Swinburne and Wilde would be more highly regarded in Germany than in Britain. Bridgwater's documented study casts light on the central cultural issues of the day, including ideas of morality, truth and subjectivism in art, comparing Pater and Wilde with Nietzsche, and George Moore, that chameleon of the decadent 90s, with Schopenhauer."

The first full-length study of the main German contributors to the Gothic canon, to each of whom a chapter is devoted, The German Gothic Novel in Anglo-German Perspective is an original historical and comparative study that goes well beyond the necessary review of the evidence to include much new material, many new insights and pieces of analysis, and some fundamental changes of perspective. The book aims to put the record straight in bibliographical and literary historical terms, and to act as a reference guide to facilitate future research, so that anyone working on the German Gothic novel or on Anglo-German interactions in the field of Gothic, will find there references to all the relevant secondary literature. The German Gothic Novel in Anglo-German Perspective is addressed to Germanists, but also to teachers and students of English, American and comparative literature, for there is at present hardly a ‘hotter’ subject than Gothic. The book’s emphasis on the Gothic work of canonical writers should prompt even conservative German Departments to reconsider their attitude to Gothic. Being addressed to scholars and students of German, German quotations are given in German, but English translations are added for the convenience of English and American scholars and students of Gothic, who represent another important section of the books’ target audience.

British Images of Germany is the first full-length cultural history of Britain's relationship with Germany in the key period leading up to the First World War. Richard Scully reassesses what is imagined to be a fraught relationship, illuminating the sense of kinship Britons felt for Germany even in times of diplomatic tension.

Of all the parts of the world to interest the Victorians, Germany was among the most important. Though less well known today, partly in consequence of the events of the twentieth century, German influences in Britain were strong, and their legacy substantial. This book charts the emergence, development and course of the Victorian interest in Germany. Its multidisciplinary approach, which binds together for the first time the latest research conducted in a variety of areas, shows how a discourse developed in Britain regarding Germany and the Germans which spilled over from one area of life to another, and included some of the most prominent figures in Victorian life. It provides a framework for understanding the causes of the Victorian fascination with Germany, and argues forcefully that the roots of this lay in the processes of modernisation taking place in each place respectively. It also points to the deep impact this had upon the course of British history and reveals how it prepared the ground for the future direction of Anglo-German relations.

Charting the period that extends from the 1860s to the 1940s, this volume offers fresh perspectives on Aestheticism and Modernism. By acknowledging that both movements had a passion for the ‘new’, it goes beyond the alleged divide between Modernism and its predecessors. Rather than reading the modernist credo, ‘Make it New!’, as a desire to break away from the past, the authors of this book suggest reading it as a continuation and a reappropriation of the spirit of the ‘New’ that characterizes Aestheticism. Basing their arguments on recent reassessments of Aestheticism and Modernism and their articulation, contributors take up the challenge of interrogating the connections, continuities, and intersections between the two movements, thus revealing the working processes of cultural and aesthetic change so as to reassess the value of the new for each. Attending to well-known writers such as Waugh, Woolf, Richardson, Eliot, Pound, Ford, Symons, Wilde, and Hopkins, as well as to hitherto neglected figures such as Lucas Malet, L.S. Gibbon, Leonard Woolf, or George Egerton, they revise assumptions about Aestheticism and Modernism and their very definitions. This collection brings together international scholars specializing in Aestheticism or Modernism who push their analyses beyond their strict period of expertise and take both movements into account through exciting approaches that borrow from aesthetics, philosophy, or economics. The volume proposes a corrective to the traditional narratives of the history of Aestheticism and Modernism, revitalizing definitions of these movements and revealing new directions in aestheticist and modernist studies.

Decadence and Orientalism in England and Germany, 1880-1920 examines the Orientalist portrayal of Middle Eastern cultures in Decadent Literatures in England and Germany at the turn of the century. This book argues that the role of Orientalism in literary Decadence uniquely exposes its paradoxical engagement with other cultures. In bringing together two fin-de-siècle European literatures, this comparative study makes a case for the transnational, if not imperial, nature of Decadence. The East emerges as an 'indispensable' mediator between various versions of European Decadence. The book examines the role of the East with specific reference to selected English and German authors: starting from Oscar Wilde's Victorian vision of Egypt and Arthur Symons's and Violet Fane's image of Constantinople, it moves to Paul Scheerbart's and Else Lasker-Schüler's Decadent Babylon and Assyria and concludes by turning to Stefan George's exclusion of the East from his poetic practice. The geographical reach of the East focuses on regions of the Eastern Mediterranean and Northern Africa. The cultural translation of specifically the Middle East into different European national contexts gains new—sometimes oppositional—meanings, avoiding a one-sided representation of both the East and the two national literatures that absorbed it. In arguing for a Decadent cosmopolitanism as a model of heterogeneous inclusivity that reaches beyond the binaries established by Edward Said's Orientalism, the present book brings twenty-first century theories of cosmopolitanism into dialogue with art history and literature to uncover striking synergies and interdependences between the different manifestations of Decadence in England and Germany.