P(R)OSE millenium.de: Modelle intellektueller aktivitat und tendenzen der deutschen gegenwartsliteratur in den 90er jahren (German text, Judith Hermann, Julia Franck, Christian Kracht, Elke Naters)

This dissertation is a comparative study of recent German literary debates and selected prose texts. Concepts of intellectual activity and the role of writers in the public sphere have been changing since unification. Younger generations of German authors, who are the primary focus of this investigation, have rarely joined the intellectual debates of the 1990s, which raises the question which factors account for this. This study reads the generational shift from older to younger authors as a re-evaluation of the writer's moral responsibilities, in response to the altered political landscape after unification and a significant change of the literary marketplace dominated increasingly by economic considerations and the power plays of media and Literaturkritik . In this context, the dissertation shows how young writers renegotiate their self-understanding and public role and investigates whether these transformations influence their aesthetic strategies.; Chapter one elucidates the ideal of the intellectual's role in western societies by exploring the ideas of prominent writers and intellectuals of the 20th century. Against this background, chapter two discusses debates between younger authors, such as Matthias Politycki or Maxim Biller, concerning a “new realism”. They deconstruct traditional roles of the intellectual by favoring concepts of entertainment and readability, which implies structural and aesthetic consequences for literature.; The second part provides a framework for the ongoing evaluation of post-unification literature. Through its interpretation of selected prose texts, the dissertation takes issue with literary trends debated in the last few years. Chapter three questions the notion of Literarisches Fräuleinwunder by analyzing the depiction of gender relations in Judith Hermann ( Sommerhaus, später, 1998) and Julia Franck (Bauchlandung. Geschichten zum Anfassen, 2000). Chapter four evaluates the notion of pop literature and then investigates links with (post-) modern literature in Christian Kracht (Faserland, 1996) and in Elke Naters' novels (Königinnen, 1998; Lügen, 1999). Like the intellectual debates, these texts assess and refigure experiences in post-unification Germany and are relevant as aesthetic and cultural interventions, probing critically the construction of a “new” cultural identity in the Berlin Republic.