Kurze Rede, langer Sinn: Short Prose from the Enlightenment to Romanticism
- Autumn 2014
Syllabus Description:
Kurze Rede, langer Sinn:
Short Prose from the Enlightenment to Romanticism
“Der Amerikaner, der den Kolumbus zuerst entdeckte, machte eine böse Entdeckung.”
(The American who first discovered Columbus made a bad discovery.)
-Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, 1783
From the Enlightenment penchant for fables to the Romantic passion for fragments, many of the profoundest ideas of the long eighteenth century came to be encapsulated in the form of short textual passages. In turn, the art of brief, pithy prose rose to new levels of regard and technical finesse during this time. The very simplicity and harmony of the form proved to be a remarkably adept vessel for radically complex and disconcerting ideas.
In this course we will look at prose texts whose common denominator is their brevity. The genres that will come under consideration are: Aphorism, fragment, joke, anecdote, short story – and “shortest story.” In addition to observing the differentiating and unifying characteristics of these various short forms, we will peer through each one as through a window (or, considering its size, a peephole) to the history, culture, and philosophy of the times in which it appeared. We will read a great variety of short prose by writers as diverse as Lichtenberg, Lessing, Goethe, Schlegel, Novalis, Hölderlin, Hebel, and Kleist.
Readings and classroom discussion in German. Writing assignments in English.
Additional Details:
“Der Amerikaner, der den Kolumbus zuerst entdeckte, machte eine böse Entdeckung.”
(The American who first discovered Columbus made a bad discovery.)
-Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, 1783
From the Enlightenment penchant for fables to the Romantic passion for fragments, many of the profoundest ideas of the long eighteenth century came to be encapsulated in the form of short textual passages. In turn, the art of brief, pithy prose rose to new levels of regard and technical finesse during this time. The very simplicity and harmony of the form proved to be a remarkably adept vessel for radically complex and disconcerting ideas.
In this course we will look at prose texts whose common denominator is their brevity. The genres that will come under consideration are: Aphorism, fragment, joke, anecdote, short story – and “shortest story.” In addition to observing the differentiating and unifying characteristics of these various short forms, we will peer through each one as through a window (or, considering its size, a peephole) to the history, culture, and philosophy of the times in which it appeared. We will read a great variety of short prose by writers as diverse as Lichtenberg, Lessing, Goethe, Schlegel, Novalis, Hölderlin, Hebel, and Kleist.
Readings and classroom discussion in German. Writing assignments in English.