Holocaust literature

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Holocaust literature refers to all types of literature that deals with the content of the Holocaust . According to the Holocaust Literature Unit at the Justus Liebig University in Giessen, it comprises many types of text that transcend the boundaries of the classic literary genres of epic , poetry and drama . However, the name is controversial.

designation

The term Holocaust literature comes from the USA and, according to the Giessen model, includes “authentic” writings written by survivors and fictional texts. The authors can be directly (as perpetrators or victims) or indirectly (for example as members of the Holocaust successor generations ) connected to the Holocaust. Texts on the topic written by bystanders are also counted.

The text types include diaries and chronicles from the time of the Holocaust, then memoirs and recollections and fictional texts (novels, poems, dramas) that deal with the Holocaust centrally. “Fictional” is understood here to mean imaginary or fictional people and characters, events and places.

The Giessen definition of the genre distinguishes literary from historical and scientific texts ("metadocuments"). She understands this to mean texts that want to convey what is happening with literary stylistic devices (for example tropics and archetypes ) and that arrange the events in a suggestive way, without following scientific criteria and conventions.

Although the term was increasingly accepted and established in reviews and scientific research, it remained unclear. Sometimes only fictional texts or texts written by Holocaust survivors are meant. According to Imre Kertész, the latter was referred to as “camp literature” until the 1960s.

The term “Holocaust” is also understood differently in the definition of the literary genre: It can be limited to the extermination of European Jews or extended to all victim groups of the National Socialist “racial”, persecution and extermination policies. The Giessen definition understands the term in the broadest sense, without neglecting the uniqueness of the planned extermination of European Jews. In order to capture this, the term " Shoah " is recommended for use. This is closely related to the term "Holocaust" and is not used separately from it.

See also

literature

  • Heinz Ludwig Arnold (Ed.): Literature and Holocaust. text + kritik # 144, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-88377-612-2 .
  • Stephan Braese, Holger Gehle, Doron Kiesel u. a. (Ed.): German post-war literature and the Holocaust. Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1998, ISBN 3-593-36092-6 .
  • Marc Caplan: Khurbn. In: Dan Diner (Ed.): Encyclopedia of Jewish History and Culture (EJGK). Volume 3: He-Lu. Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2012, ISBN 978-3-476-02503-6 , pp. 341-345.
  • Sam Dresden: Literature and the Holocaust. Jüdischer Verlag, Frankfurt 1997, ISBN 3-633-54133-0 .
  • Sascha Feuchert (Ed.): Holocaust Literature: Auschwitz. Reclam, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-15-015047-7 .
  • Anita Haviv, Ralf Hexel (ed.): The thorn bush that did not burn. Survivors of the Shoah in Israel, Friedrich -Ebert- Foundation Israel 2011, ISBN 978-3-86498-300-9 .
  • Michael Hofmann: literary history of the Shoah: theory and examples. Aschendorff, Münster 2003, ISBN 3-402-04176-6 .
  • Petra Kiedaisch (Ed.): Poetry after Auschwitz? Adorno and the poets. Reclam, Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-15-009363-5 .
  • Manuel Köppen and Klaus R. Scherpe (eds.): Pictures of the Holocaust. Literature, film, visual arts. Böhlau, Cologne 1997, ISBN 3-412-05197-7 .
  • Matías Martínez , ed .: The Holocaust and the Arts. Mediality and authenticity of depictions of the Holocaust in literature, film, video, painting, monuments, comics and music. Aisthesis, Bielefeld 2004 ISBN 3-89528-459-9 .
  • Andrea Reiter: "So that they emerge from the darkness." The literary coping with concentration camp experience. Löcker, Vienna 1995, ISBN 3-85409-246-6 .
  • Alvin Rosenfeld: A mouth full of silence. Literary responses to the Holocaust. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht , Göttingen 2000, ISBN 3-525-20808-1 .
  • Mirjam Schmid: Representability of the Shoah in novels and films. Kulturgeschichtliche Reihe, 12. Sonnenberg, Annweiler am Trifels 2012, ISBN 978-3-933264-70-1 .
  • Thomas Taterka: Dante German. Studies on camp literature. Erich Schmidt, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-503-04911-8 .
  • James E. Young : Describing the Holocaust. Presentation and consequences of the interpretation. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1997, ISBN 3-518-39231-X .
  • Katja Zinn: Literary versions of the Litzmannstadt ghetto . Holocaust literature as a mirror of the culture of remembrance, presented in texts by victims, perpetrators, bystanders and later born. Dissertation, Justus Liebig University , Giessen 2009 ( online )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Imre Kertész: Dossier K .: an investigation. Translated by Kristin Schwamm. Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg 2006, p. 11.
  2. ↑ on the linking of writing and language with other media in literature with Ruth Klüger , Jakob Littner , Wolfgang Koeppen and Primo Levi ; in the comic by Art Spiegelman , Maus - The story of a survivor ; at the monument ( Jochen Gerz ); in video or television fiction based on Victor Klemperer's diaries; in the painting of Samuel Bak and in the music of Steve Reich