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Witzige Spielgemälde; Tieck und das Drama der Romantik by Stefan Scherer

2007; Modern Humanities Research Association; Volume: 102; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/mlr.2007.0176

2222-4319

Richard Littlejohns,

Historical, Literary, and Cultural Studies

MLR, I02.I, 2007 267 Kleist's ceuvre an 'anti-political politics' moulded by a sceptical view of programmes foraction which underestimate thecontingency and complexity ofhuman affairs,and by a powerful commitment to individual autonomy which nevertheless recognizes the claims of community or state. Plentiful footnotes indicate Griffiths's familiaritywith the literature on Kleist. That some seem randomly placed isperhaps one sign thathis study has been short ened forpublication. It iswell written and well organized, reveals an eye for textual nuance, but isnot without mistakes. Griffiths thinks the village of Thuiskon inDie Hermannsschlacht is a forest and misses the echo of theApocalypse in 'Was gilt es in diesem Kriege?' when he takes the sun darkened by blood there to represent the Enlightenment. His interpretation ofDie Familie Schroffensteindepends on a shaky equation of a feudal vassal with a bureaucrat and thequestionable assumption thatone culture cannot encompass contrastingmoral stances. The attribution of a political di mension to thisplay seems dubious. Dubious too ishis reading ofPrinz Friedrich von Homburg, which asserts thatdesire forpersonal glory is impermissible in an absolute state, and which does not distinguish between presumptuous pride and the value of honour and dignity.Griffiths skates around thewriter's turn tounambiguous militant patriotism (as ameans tohuman emancipation?) in I8o8, and leaves unconsidered the possibility that a heart set on a national uprising might choose to disregard internal divisions about the necessity orwisdom of political changes. This book will not convince everyone thatKleist applied a penetrating mind to politics. Yet it is insightful on the tensions in his attitude to authority and on the wider implications of his rejection of guarantees ofmoral and social improvement. Its strength lies in its exploration ofKleist's treatment of human problems which bedevil political plans: for instance, theunfathomable interplay of nature and nurture portrayed in 'Der Findling'. UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL JOHN HIBBERD Witzige Spielgemdlde: Tieck und das Drama der Romantik. By STEFAN SCHERER. (Quellen und Forschungen zur Literatur- und Kunstgeschichte, n.s. 26) Berlin: de Gruyter. 2003. viii+652pp. Eio8. ISBN 978-3-II-0I7774-9. In Friedrich Schlegel's Brief uiberdenRoman the expression 'witzige Spielgemalde' isused tocharacterize the 'Arabeske', thepictorial equivalent of thenovel as Schlegel defines it, the formwhich in his view subsumes all genres and embodies universal Romantic poetry. In this monograph Stefan Scherer applies Schlegel's concept to the drama, seeing such playful and imaginative composition and structure as thedefining featureof a specific genre ofRomantic drama. Hence he does not cover the full reper toireof thedramatic works of theGerman Romantics, discounting anywhich do not correspond tohis definition.He excludes at least one writer who isnormally regarded as Romantic-Zacharias Werner-and includes some who are usually held to be on theperiphery of themovement, such asWilhelm von Schiitz with his Lacrimas and Friedrich Kind of the epigonal Dresden 'Pseudoromantik'. From thisperspective Romantic drama is inScherer's view a 'paradoxe Gattung'. As 'witzige Spielgemalde' these texts are ostensibly intended for the theatre, but in practice they are too cerebral and too text-focused tobe staged. They remain essen tially 'Lesedramen', based on self-reflection, on plays within plays, Romantic irony, wordplay, and intertextual reference.For this reason theyare bound tobe unsuccess ful, seeking to implement Early Romantic theory in amedium inwhich itcould not be effective. Not surprisingly,Tieck's early comedies, such asDer gestiefelte Kater, are seen as the principal model for such texts. Scherer believes, however, thatTieck's influence 268 Reviews was more extensive, and in the longest section of the book he examines thewhole of Tieck's dramatic work from the unfinished and heterogeneous fragments of his student period to the 'Diumchen' fairy talewritten for his Phantasus collection in I8 I I.Tieck scholars will welcome this in-depth examination ofTieck's drama, which closes a gap. Yet here a heavy hand seems to be atwork. While Leben und Tod der heiligen Genoveva is certainly an important and wrongly neglected work, as Roger Paulin firstargued inhis Tieck biography, it isdifficult to justify thedevotion of sixty pages to the derivative juvenilia which Tieck produced in the 17gos before he found his own voice, some ofwhich were not even published inhis own lifetime. Further substantial sections of the book deal with Arnim, Brentano, and Eichen dorff...