Hartmut Bleumer

Diagramm und Dimension

Diagrams are two-dimensional semantic structures, in narrative texts›story‹ and›narration‹ are kinds of movements that can give them a third dimension, so that the interplay of diagram and story may be essential to the notion of what narratologists call the diegesis. This Paper takes the Middle High German Kudrun and its notorious difficult concept of space as an example for these presumptions. It tries to show that the aggregative way of narrating leads to diagrammatic concepts of places and scenic pictures, which mirror the way of storytelling itself. The text is therefore not yet interested in a realistic fiction of space, because it creates a poetic map of storytelling along its semantic requirements.

Turn, Turn, Turn? Oder: Braucht die Germanistik eine germanistische Wende? Eine Rundfrage zum Jubiläum der LILI

The German Studies seem to be deeply splitted. On the whole as well as in each of their traditional parts (Linguistics, Literary Studies, Medieval Studies) they distinguish themselves through cyclic figures of permanent resolution. Paradoxically, however, these figures of thinking manage to cross the former interior boundaries as well. This might be seen especially in the different turns which occur in the German Studies like in other humanities, but with a certain kind of exaltation. So it may be that the cyclic figures of thinking in turns do not only have a centrifugal, but centripetal effect. Therefore one could, polemically spoken, postulate a paradox germanistic turn — this would be no ordinary positioning, rather a vote for the intriguing dynamics of German Studies.

Vom guten Recht des Teufels. Kasus, Tropus und die Macht der Sprache beim Stricker und im Erzählmotiv »The Devil and the Lawyer« (AT 1186; Mot M 215)

The devil is a famous figure in the medieval discourse on justice and is notoriously reliable in legal actions. Thus he occurs in a story-type which presents the devil as seizing lawyers or judges. In several examples dating from the early the 13th century onward, this story-type seems to discuss the difficult relationship between legal rationality and narrative values. From these stories emerges a small but complete model of law and literature. Their structures reveal a common primary concern: whether judgement on a case solely derived according to the logic of legal rules can also be just (billig) without the influence of narrative patterns. If so, legal thinking would lack a higher tropological sense of what is true. At the very least, the story-type demonstrates what performativity in justice means: to pass a judgment on someone is shown as a speech act similar to praying or cursing. This implies not only that the narration can also become a kind of verdict, but also that the story-type itself has to be judged in a space between law and literature.

Gottfrieds ›Tristan‹ und die generische Paradoxie

Taking the example of Gottfrieds ›Tristan‹ it can be seen how a paradoxical relationship between epic literature and Minnesang is being established which, far before the era of lyric poetry, allows a certain lyrical quality to appear in the narrative. The narrative, stressing the aesthetical effect of the Sang on different levels and even imitating it, leads – especially in ›Tristan‹ – to certain effects which can be described as »poetical emergence«. On the one hand Gottfrieds narration – as in the sang – aims at overcoming its own undeniable temporal distance from the narrated by the contact-medium of voice. This is an attempt to sublate the narrative into a presence of its own, which is why it fails in the narrative course. On the other hand Tristans and Isoldes failure and, likewise, that of their story and of its narrator turns out to be the prerequisite for aesthetically realizing the ideal of a time-exempt presence.

Das Vertrauen und die Vertraute

The possibility to gain symbolic control of complex social relations by trust results from practised emotional bonds. This is why the article suggests to define trust as ‚habitualized emotion‘. Making use of systems theory it approaches the literary type of the confidante in Heinrichs von Veldeke ,Eneit‘, in Hartmanns ,Iwein‘ and Gottfrieds ,Tristan‘, describing scopes and precarious consequences of trust. It can be shown that medieval literature serves as a medium for leading a differentiated discussion on the semantic potential of trust long before the notion acquires its simplified early modern meaning. At the same time the limits of systems theory can be made evident in the work with historical texts: whereas systems theory emphasizes that the risks of trust result from the desire to reduce complexity, the texts prove that this risk might turn out to be a free scope which systems theory can not get under control.

Dietrichs Flucht. Textgeschichtliche Ausgabe. Hg. von Elisabeth Lienert und Gertrud Beck. 2003

Die jüngeren Wandlungen des Textbegriffs betreffen notwendig auch die Ansprüche an Editionen. Die veränderten Herausforderungen an den Editor dokumentieren sich zwar seit längerem im Nebeneinander unterschiedlicher Editionsverfahren, erst unter dem Einfluß des beschleunigten Theorieimports in die Mediävistik wird aber auch hier deutlich, daß die begrifflichen Verschiebungen den Ort des Textes selbst stärker ins Bewußtsein bringen: Die Wahl der angemessenen Editionsweise ist eben nicht nur eine Frage der Entstehungsbedingungen und der Überlieferungslage, sie hängt auch von den epistemologischen Voraussetzungen des Editors ab, die vorgängig festlegen, was eigentlich die maßgebliche Realisationsweise eines Textes ist. Daher ist die Rückkehr zur Philologie ein ebenso schwieriges wie erstrebenswertes Geschäft. So wie man von einer allgemeinen kulturkritischen Warte gegenwärtig fordern kann, sich nach der Dekonstruktion wieder einer philologischen Praxis anzuvertrauen, um deren Aufklärung man sich zugleich bemüht, so ist auch für den mediävistischen Editor nach den ‚New Philology‘-Debatten das Verhältnis von traditioneller Textkritik und dokumentarischer Handschriftentreue zu überdenken. Aber welche Position man auch immer dabei einnimmt: Durch das gewandelte Lektüreverhalten der Interpreten geraten beim Umgang mit Editionen nicht allein der Weg des Herausgebers, sondern die in seinem Weg sichtbar werdenden impliziten Vorannahmen mit in den Blick.