Edinburgh German Yearbook 7

Building on a long tradition in German-language literature and culture, this volume focuses on contemporary engagements with ethical concerns in literary texts, essays, and films.

Building on a long tradition in German-language literature and culture, this volume focuses on contemporary engagements with ethical concerns in literary texts, essays, and films.

There has been an "ethical turn" in the literature, culture, and theory of recent years. Questions of morality are urgent at a time of increasing global insecurities. Yet it is becoming ever more difficult to make ethical judgments in multicultural, relativist societies. The European economic meltdown has raised further ethical difficulties, widening the gap between rich and poor. Such divisions and difficulties heighten the widespread fear of "the other"in its various manifestations. And in the German context especially, the past and its representation offer ongoing moral challenges.

These ethical concerns have found their way into recent German-language literature andculture in texts that deal with history and memory (Timm, Petzold, Schoch, Strubel); materiality (Krauß, Overath); gender (Berg, Schneider); age and generation (Moster, Pehnt, Schalansky); religion, especially Islam (Senocak, Kermani, Ruete); and nomadism (Tawada). The relationship between self and other; the connection between particular and general; the personal and political consequences of individuals' actions; and the potential, and danger, of representation itself are issues that are vital to the shaping of our future ethical landscapes, as this volume demonstrates.

Contributors: Monika Albrecht, Angelika Baier, David N. Coury, Anna Ertel & Tilmann Köppe, Emily Jeremiah, Alasdair King, Frauke Matthes, Aine McMurtry, Gillian Pye, Kate Roy.

Emily Jeremiah is Senior Lecturer in German at Royal Holloway, University of London. Frauke Matthes is Lecturer in German at the University ofEdinburgh.

Introduction: Ethical Approaches in Contemporary German-Language Literature and Culture
"The Absoluteness of the Knowledge Once Possessed": 1968 Ethics and Consensual Ethics in Uwe Timm's NovelRot
What the World Needs Now: Rancière, Ethology, and Christian Petzold'sToter Mann (2001) andWolfsburg (2003)
Materiality and Ethics in Recent German Prose Narratives by Angelika Overath and Angela Krauß
Shameful Stories: The Ethics of East German Memory Contests in Fiction by Julia Schoch, Stefan Moster, Antje Rávic Strubel, and Judith Schalansky
Affective Encounters and Ethical Responses in Robert Schneider'sDie Luftgängerin and Sybille Berg'sVielen Dank für das Leben
Narrative Ethics and the Problems of Age and Aging in Annette Pehnt'sHaus der Schildkröten
"So ähnlich könnte es gewesen sein, aber [. . .]": Unethical Narrations of Emily Ruete's "Große Wandlungen"
Enlightenment Fundamentalism: Zafer Senocak, Navid Kermani, and Multiculturalism in Germany Today
Voicing Rupture: Ethical Concerns in Short Prose and Lyric Texts by Yoko Tawada