Der Sonderweg in der Postmoderne : zum Identitätsdiskurs in bundesdeutschen Romanen bis 1989

Abstract

After 1945 Germany was more and more taken in by the Cold War. It was no surprise, that two German states were founded 1949. One essential issue for both of them was the construction of a new German identity. This question was discussed at different levels within society. Bernhard Giesen has created a framework for discribing the answers to this question: he describes, how an interest in the present and the future was most influential within the so called ‘Wirtschaftswundernation’, whereas the other side looked at the difficult German past in creating a new German identity. Many writers contributed in focussing on the past as is shown in this dissertation by looking at the work of Heinrich Böll, Wolfgang Koeppen, Günter Grass, Uwe Johnson en Martin Walser. In the 60s, 70s and 80s, a new paradigm became influential within German society: postmodernism. The research project then focusses on the contribution of postmodern German writers to the discourse on identity. Analysed are Arno Schmidts Nobodaddy’s Kinder (1963), Peter O. Chotjewitz’ Die Insel (1968), Rolf Dieter Brinkmanns Keiner weiß mehr (1968), Helmut Heißenbüttels Projekt Nr. I. D’Alemberts Ende (1970), Peter Sloterdijks Der Zauberbaum (1985) en Hanns-Josef Ortheils Schwerenöter (1987), which are commonly considered to be postmodern. These novels seem to take position between ontological and epistemologicol aims and levels. On the one hand they make clear, that any relation to reality is constructed, on the other hand however, they don’t seem to be able to abandon epistemological aims completely. They refer to reality, although they show at the same time, that this is not possible, because in them their authors’, one could say, postmodern commitment to contribute to the construction of German identity on the basis of the ‘Holocaust’ is reflected, thus showing at a Sonderweg in postmodernism within the FRG