This essay compares two distinct traditions of narrative theory: on the one hand, that of structuralist narratology as it emerged in the 1960s and in its various subsequent manifestations; on the other, that of German-languageErzähltheorie as codified in the 1950s, with a prehistory dating back to German classicism. Having mapped the connections between these traditions, this essay then concentrates on exploring how narratology, unlike German narrative theory, has come to broaden its project exponentially since its first critical incarnation as a strictly formalist poetics. While the German tradition has concentrated on rhetoric and voice (with reception theory constituting a largely separate area of inquiry), narratology, which frames the text within a symmetry of real, implied, and fictional intelligences, has always had the potential to pose questions about how narrative functions in relation to a surrounding world of ideas. Of the two only narratology can therefore theorize both authorship and reading. In specific terms, this essay argues that the controversial narratological abstraction of implied authorship represents the only point at which a negotiation between textual and contextual worlds can logically take place. Evidence of how crucial such theorization has been in the development of contextualist narratology is sought in the examination of a test case, namely the much-disputed project of feminist narratology.
The Zeltenplatz, a feature of Berlin's Tiergarten, played a unique role in the city's social life for nearly two centuries. This essay traces the changing clientele of this gathering place during three distinct phases of its history: its initial eighteenth-century heyday, when it was famed for drawing large and extraordinarily heterogeneous crowds; the period following the Napoleonic Wars, culminating in the 1848 revolution, crucial events of which took place at the Zeltenplatz; and the 1880s, as modern Berlin assumed its place as capital of the new German Empire. At the core of this history for over a century is a contest between aristocratic privilege and the aspirations of Berlin's growing bourgeoisie. Relying on fictional texts, reports by travellers, and various descriptions of the city, this essay describes how the Zeltenplatz, still beyond the full control of civic authorities until 1861, offered unusual freedoms for challenging, playfully or otherwise, the established order and social hierarchies of urban life. Evident throughout is the marked theatricality of this space, which the crowds exploited either to perform, and thereby to confirm, an existing social order or to rehearse new roles and enact social configurations whose realisation in Berlin proper still lay in the future. Der Zeltenplatz im Berliner Tiergarten spielte während beinahe zwei Jahrhunderte eine einzigartige Rolle im gesellschaftlichen Leben der Stadt. Die vorliegende Studie skizziert die sich wandelnde Kundschaft des beliebten Treffpunktsüber drei verschiedene Phasen hinweg: 1.) in seiner ersten Glanzzeit im 18. Jahrhundert, als er regelmäßig von großen, extrem heterogenen Volksmassen frequentiert wurde; 2.) im Zeitraum vor und während der Revolution von 1848, deren Szenen sich zum Teil am Zeltenplatz abspielten; und 3.) in den Jahren nach 1880, in denen das moderne Berlin seine Rolle als Hauptstadt des neuen Deutschen Reiches beanspruchte. Kennzeichnend für große Teile der Geschichte des Zeltenplatzes ist die Spannung zwischen den Privilegien des Adels und den Ambitionen des wachsenden Berliner Bürgertums. Unter Bezugnahme auf fiktionale Texte, Reiseberichte und Stadtbeschreibungen untersucht die vorliegende Studie die ungewöhnlichen Freiheiten, die der Zeltenplatz -bis 1861 noch nicht unter vollständiger Kontrolle der städtischen Behörden -der Berliner Bevölkerung anbot, um die existierenden Hierarchien spielerisch oder ernsthaft infrage zu stellen. Als besonders prägnant erweist sich in dieser Hinsicht das theatralische Potenzial des Platzes, welches die dort versammelten Berliner ausnutzten, um entweder einerseits die bestehende gesellschaftliche Ordnung demonstrativ zu bestätigen oder andererseits neue Rollen auszutesten und soziale Konfigurationen
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