Poetics of Childhood – Figures, Discourses, Theories

Catalog description

This seminar explores the literary representation of the child and childhood. It focuses on three key areas, which will be examined through a selection of texts by authors including Hoffmann, Keller, Busch, James, Proust, Rilke, Benjamin, and March. (1) Figures: The seminar will analyze literary depictions of the foreign, mysterious, anarchic, and, most importantly, the evil child, a figuration that began to displace the Romantic image of the "divine child" by the 19th century. (2) Theories: The seminar will consider the pedagogical and developmental psychological theories of the time, which underpin this shift in discourse, alongside foundational historical and theoretical reflections on childhood, including those by Ariès and Agamben. (3) Poetics: Central to the selected texts is the question of how childhood can be grasped in literary form—what kinds of memory are invoked, and how the recalled experience of childhood can be articulated in language. Through an interdisciplinary approach, this seminar will engage with both the evolution of childhood as a cultural construct and the aesthetic challenges of representing it in literature. We will be reading both German and English literature; the reading load typically amounts to 30-50 pages per week, with the exception of two sessions in which we will discuss two English novel(la)s. Course readings and discussions will be in German