Focus Fall 1994.tif VOL. I No.2 FAll 1994 o c U S 011 [ Sample COpy / Ansichtsexemplar II jllurnlll [o r German lang "" g" l,t"T/,tll . ITERATUR Edited by J. Gregory Redding David N . Coury Herman J. De Vries, Jr. Published by [he German Graduate Student Assoc iation o f the U ni vers ity of C incinnat i ~O(,td on Ulf'rfllllr is published semiil~n~aJJ y (Spring & Fall) by the German ra uatl.' Studl.'nt Go\·ernancl.' A~soclauon of the Univl.'rsity of Cinci nnati. Editor J. Gregory Redding Assistant Editor f Il.'rm:m J. De Vries, Jr. Book Rc\'icw Editor Dilvid N. Coury Copy Editor Andreas BOllllisch SUBMISSIONS r~CII~n Lit~t'iltm' welcomes articlc submissions from 10-25 pages on topics ~e at _ to.~erman litt'rary nudles. SubmIssIons are accepted continuously ut contn Ut?rs mU~1 ~ .students.11 the tnne of submission. Manuscri t~ must be submLtted III tnpllcate to the editor and should be prepa'ed Pd Lng to the guidelines of the bte<;t ~ILA Handbook. A self.addr~e~cc:st~ card should accompany the m:lIIuscript for acknowlt>dgmclU of its rec:;p!. . . BOOK REV IEWS Unsol LcJte~ book reviews of 2·5 pages will be considered for pu blication et Focus all Lltl'ratllr prders to work WL th an est bl" I d I r "' y I d a LS Ie poo 0 re\'lewers nteresle persons are encouragt>d to IIlform tile Book Review Editor. . SUBSCRlPTIONS Annual subscriptions are SI5.00 for individuals and $22 00 r" " . d"d I d' . . . or InStltutlons' III LVI ua s an IOStllUlIons overseas add $500 r cid"" I ' . or a Hlona postage. CONTACT ADDRESS Send subscription fees a.nd all other correspondence to FOOiJ on Litf'rt1ll1r, Depart.m~nt o~ Gt'r~antc Languages and Literatures, Uni\"ersit of Cincin­ nati, Cmcmnatl, Oillo 45221-0372. Tel: (513) 556-2755 Fax: (513) ~56-1991. COVER: -Tht' Book Fool" from Sebastian Brant's Sh,p of Foolt"S London 1~70~ cou~~y of .the ArchIves and Rare Books Departmem, Universil\' of ClIlcmnat l LlbrarLe<;. Cover design br Giana Morrell. ' Member § Council of EdilOrs of Lt'arned Journals ISSN 1076-5697 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Volume one o f FQc/lJ 011 LiteraCltr moved from idea to reality only through the help of many people. Department Head Suzanne Shipley and the emire faculty of Germanic Languages have giwn more t han their fair share of advice and support. Richard Schade deser\'e~ special thanks for answering our many questions. Dean Judith Trent along with Greg Kostraba, Melissa Hardoby, and lhe UniverSity of C incinnati Graduate Student Governance Associalion are especially appreciated for their ongoing financial support. Dane I {euchemer, Richard Bowen, Mya Poe, Patricia Hill, and Erin Lampe have al l helped in various significanl ways. l-.1anaging a journal is difficult enough; it would be impo~sible without the assi~tal1ce of the our professorial referees. The fo llowing people graciously evaluated :U1.icles fo r volume one of Focus: t lamiholl Beck, Beth Bjorklund, Irene Compton, Robert Conard, Garry Fourman, Erhard Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Alan Gall, Michael Geisler, Kath arina Gerstenberger,Jerry Glenn, Edward I Juris, Frank I lirschbach, Susanne Kord, Phil McKnight, Christi ane Seil er, Ri chard Schade, Don Tolzmann,james \'all der Laa.n, ~'lanfr('d Zimmermann. om the edilor tides Focus on Literatur Volume I, Number 2 Fall 1994 Contents inter Answers in the Poetry lise Aichinger \tANDA RrrCJ-HE merica: A Modern Day Tauris? Study of Two Adaptations of the Iphigenie Myth A TIIERINE r..1ARsHALL .lislische Elell1lcl1lc in cler Prosa von Brigitte rouauer exemplarisch dargestelh an RIta Miinster, >nttener &genschiitu und Frau Miibfenbtck 1m Gehiills AGMAIt SCHUU er Stand des Experiments uod der A vantgarde der deulschsprachigen Literatur am Beispiel ~s Osterreichischen Literaturmaga7ins perspeklive NKA FINGER ook reviews einer Kunze, Am Somlcnhang & Gilmer de 8ruyn, ZWlSchrnbilanz Ielga Konigsdorf, 1m Schatlen des RegctJbogens v, III 129 141 151 167 17 1 j \ , , • I , , I I I Gert Hofmann, Die kleme Stechardm Franz Hodjak. Landverlll5l Gert Niers, \Vortgrtmd ,lOch: L)'nk Imd Prosa Christoph Hein, Das Napoleon-SpIel Ulrich Woelk, Rtlcksll1el Birger Sellin, icb will kein imnicb mehr 5em Gunter Kunert, 1m lolen \Vj'lkel Gisela Corleis, Brand BOlho StrauB, Das GlelChgewlcht Jurgen Becker, Foxtrot! 1m Erfimer StadlOn Uwe Timm, Die Entdeckutlg der CUYr)"U'Uyst T ankred Dorst, Herr Patti Martin Walser, Ohne ell1a1l(ler Doris Gercke, How many miles to Babyloll Brigitte Kronauer, Hin- tOld herbrausende lrige interview Ein Zirkel, der sich sch lieBt INTERVlEW MIT GliNTER KUNERT contributors announcements 173 176 180 182 187 189 192 194 197 199 202 205 208 211 215 219 231 232 " From the Editor A debate has grown around the issue o f graduate srudem publish­ ing. Several editorials and essays in the past year have focused on the pressure to publish placed on gr.lduate students by the current job markel. Some h~ve been supportive. recognizing the market forces which have created th e pressure. O thers, the most distu rbing of which was a highl y editorial ized announcement in last fall 's Gennan Sl1Id le5 ASSOCIation News/euel', suggest t hat graduate student scholarship is by definition inferior to faculty scholarship , sen'lng only to 'clog' th e review process and delay the evaluation o f more deserving faculty submissio ns. The author of that an nou ncement goes 0 1' to imply that devious graduate <; lUdents slyly submi t articles on depanmemal let­ terhead to fool editors in to thinkin g they are faculty members: "They do not yet give themsel ves a false faculty rank,~ the text reads, "but just sign the ir names'! the bolt a m" (emphasis added).! This unfortu­ nate wording hints at the author's true thesis-that in the future, if not already, journals may find themselves so over~",helmed by gradu­ ale student submissions that they will be forced to reject non-faculty scholarship sight unseen . T o do so would make a mockery of the very nOlion of scholarly debate and dialogue. Therefo re, editors who have not carefull y defined the mission of their respecti ve journals may soon find themseh-es in an ethical dilemma. What purpose do scholarly journals serve? Most claim the role o f a forum for scholarly articles which, in the words of that loft:y phrase, "contribute to the general pool of knowledge." Yet th e GS A newslet­ ter announ cement predi cts thaI "the number of journals refusing to consider students' work will increase in proportion to th e iucrease in [student) submissions" (4) . Intentionally or not, that same edito rial creates a faculty - good, student - bad paradigm, characterized by twO things: first, while student submissions occasionall y yield a work of publishable quali ty, the bul k o f th e manuscripts are quile poor, and second . these student submissions hinder the timely evaluation of manuscripts by pro fessors. Such t hinking perpetuates the notion that the scholarly eHorts of graduate Students have little vaiue, yet facult y status is no guarant or o f quality. Ce rtainly experienced pro fessors III wiU produce qualit y manuscripts with greater consistency , but e\-ery established scholar started with a fi rst publication. If a journal is to be truly devoted to the disseminat ion of new ideas, editors must grin a'.ld bear the task o f evaluat ing every submission, without regard to. ItS point of o rigin . O t.herwise edito rs must d rop the pretense of b.hnd submissions and ask scho lars to submit \'Ilae along wilh manuscripts, this done at the risk that journals become th e exclusi\-e forum of an elite group of scholars. Although graduate students today fee l an eve r-i ncreasing pressure to perform, most can affo rd to ta ke a great deal o f time an d care in preparing a manuscript for submiss ion. T here is a la rge incidence of self-censorship among student scholars, and as a result the PMLA re­ pon s that it accepts a greater percel1lage of submissions by graduate students than by faculty members.2 That stude nts in graduate pro­ grams are producing vi able scholarshi p should com e as a surprise to no o ne . Graduate students today are no longe r allowed to be just students. In va rious ways t hey are also teachers, edito rs, lecturers, scholars, auth ors, administrators-in short, there are few aspects of the profession which ad vanced degree candidates have not been e~­ posed to tn at least some smal l war. In addition , with such a compell­ tive job market people are remaini ng graduate students for a longer time. As a result there is o ften a very fi ne li ne bet ween junior faculty members and se nior graduate students. Indeed, a student who is JUSt completing a dissertation can potel1liall y have broader experience than man )' new facult y members. In th e course of a graduate student ca­ reer, it is even possible that o lle could become ,be expert on an au­ th or, particul arly understudied or younger writers. Yet some people apparentl y do not wish to ackn owl edge a graduate student as an au­ thority on a parti cular sub ject . O ne issue is clear, however: ~n )'on.e writing an article which incl udes in formati on previously pUbhsh: d IS ethical ly bound to cite dl e original, regardless of wh o the au.thor Is:,r where the original quotat ion was published. T o do otherwise, to Ig­ nore that work, is either poo r scholarship or outright plagiarism . The increasing frequency of graduate student submissions to schol­ arly journals is attributed to t he extremely competitive job market. Yet there is in fact no such entity as a "job market." The pressure to publish comes not fro l11 some myt hological beast (although it seems that way at limes), but rather from the professors who populate aca­ demic departments and job search screenin g committees. O ne unaware \ III '11emberof the audience attending the "Mock Interyiews for Job Seek· :rs in Foreign Languages" session at the 1993 MLA Conference asked :he panel just how important publications are for applicants. "They lre expected,n was panel member Renee Waldinge r's emphatic reply. Hiring committees have placed a premium on candidates with publi­ ::nion records, and hopeful Applicant .. these days recogni7e that to :ompete with other candidates, they must demonstrate scholarly po­ tential. The advertisements in the mOst recem MLA Job Information List are peppered wllh phrases like "evidence of active schola rship," or "outstanding research potential" and the like. II is onl y a slight exaggeration to say that ~ i l11ply to get a job these days, graduate stu­ dents must have a "ita which resembles one which would have S21is· fied requirements for tenure twenty years ago. The answer, o f course, is a decrca~e in the emphasis on franlic publishing. While currentS of such thought have been felt, the situa­ tioo is unlikely to change as long as the paucity of jobs makes scholar­ sh ip a useful determinant in the hi ring process. To that end we offer Foclls on Literatllr. The cOntentS of this second issue cover the spec­ trum of German-language literature, from poetry to drama to prose, from the well·established to the cuuing edge. Amanda Ritchie offers an alternative interpretation of winter imagery in the poetry of lise Aichinger, while Catherine Marshall compares depictions of America in dramas by Egon Vietta and Use Langner. A structural analysis of Brigitte Kronauer's prose forms the foundation of a contribution by Dagmar Schulz, and Anke Finger teams up with Ralf Korte in a dis cussion of the current state of avant-garde literature in the German­ speaking world. Among the eighteen titles discussed in the book reo view section are works by canonized figures such as Martin Walser and Reiner Kunze, as well as lesser-known writers like Doris Gercke and Ulrich Woelk. Finall y, the issue is rounded out by an interview with Gi.inter Kunert, in which the celeb rated poet talks instead about his extensive prose work. It is our hope that every reader will find sometlung of interest among these diverse contents. j. Gregory Redding I "Gradu.te StudentS Look for Faculty Positions," German Sludl~ Associa no', Nw:slmn-18.1 (1993): 3. I Reponed by the Executive Council at the ·Welcome to the MLA: An IntroduCtion (or Gradu