Women's Collective: Female Authorship in the Novel Leben Und Abenteuer

Annales Academiae Paedagogicae Cracoviensis Folia 49 Studia Romanica III (2008)

Aleksandra Bednarowska Women’s collective: female authorship in the novel Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura by Irmtraud Morgner

In Room of One’s Own Virginia Woolf envisioned a time, when women: will have ceased to be the protected sex. Logically they will take part in all the activi- ties and exertions that were once denied them. The nursemaid will heave coal. The shop woman will drive an engine. All assumptions founded on the facts observed when women were the protected sex will have disappeared… Anything may happen when womanhood has ceased to be a protected occupation1. Three important novels by East German authors, which were published in 1974, offered a critical vision of women’s lives in a land, in which Woolf’s vision became close to the reality. These three boundary crossing novels: Irmtraud Morgner’s Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura (the title of the American translation is The Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatrice as Chronicled by Her Minstrel Laura), Brigitte Reimann’s Franziska Linkerhand and Gerti Tetzner’s Karen W. questioned the reality of women’s emancipation under socialism. In absence of free political discussion in the media, literature became an important venue for examination of issues of gender. The above mentioned women writers, broke the silence about women’s discrimination in a socialist society, and spoke out about women’s limited presence in the public sphere. They spoke out against the double burden and criticized patriarchal family structure, in which women still carried most of the household duties. Socialism offered women equal rights, but it did not change prevailing attitudes towards women. One has to note that the scope of the discussion was, however, limited to the criticism of people’s mentality. The socialist system was presented, as the only viable option for East Germany and its existence was not questioned. Many critics hailed Morgner’s novel Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura as ‘the most important work of GDR 1 Woolf, Virginia, 27–28. 72 Aleksandra Bednarowska literature to deal with women’s emancipation’2. Recent translation into English3 from the year 2000 brought a renewed interest in the novel and new studies of Morgner’s works appeared in English4. Westgate’s book Strategies under Surveillance: Reading Irmtraud Morgner as a GDR writer places Morgner as a political writer whose works were primarily influenced by the ‘socialist ideal and its deformation in the GDR’5. Emde’s study Entering History. Feminist Dialogues in Irmtraud Morgner Prose centers on Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz and views the novel as an example of postmodernist literature. Emde calls Morgner ‘one of the most dar- ing and radical aestheticians of her generations’6 and identifies her ultimate goal as helping women enter history. In this paper I introduce Morgner’s novel Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura, which is virtually unknown in Poland and present its innovative structure. Women’s rights and the role of women in society are central concerns throughout the novel. The difficulties women face in the modern world – in the GDR and elsewhere, are presented both through the actual experiences of two protagonists named in the title of the novel: Beatrice and Laura, as well as through other examples. Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura was the first volume of a planned trilogy. The second part Amanda was published in 1983. Parts of the unfinished third volume were published posthumously in 1998 under the title Das heroische Testament. ‘Of course this country is a land of miracles’7, reads the first and the last sentence of Morgner’s novel. In a short introduction she explains how she came into posses- sion of ‘five pounds of paper’ i.e. the manuscript describing the life and unlikely

2 See for example: Karen Achberger, R. Karen, Friedrich Achberger, ‘Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatriz as Chronicled by Her Minstrel Laura. Irmtraud Morgner’, in: New German Critique, No. 15 (Autumn, 1978), p. 121–146. 3 Morgner, Irmtraud. The Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatrice as Chronicled by her Minstrel Laura. A Novel in Thirteen Books and Seven Intermezzos. Translated by Jeanette Claussen. Lincoln, London: University of Nebrasca Press, 2000. 4 See for example: Entering History. Feminist Dialogues in Irmtraud Morgner Prose. Silke von der Emde. Bern: Peter Lang Verlag, 2004. Strategies under Surveillance: Reading Irmtraud Morgner as a GDR writer. Geoffrey Westgate. Amsterdam: Rodopi 2002. 5 Westgate, Geoffrey, 8. 6 Emde, Silke von der, 11. 7 Natürlich ist das Land ein Ort des Wunderbaren. All quotations from the novel in English come from the following edition: Morgner, Irmtraud. The Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatrice as Chronicled by her Minstrel Laura. A Novel in Thirteen Books and Seven Intermezzos. Translated by Jeanette Claussen. Lincoln, London: University of Nebrasca Press, 2000. The original version in German comes from the edition: Morgner, Irmtraud. Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatritz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura. Roman in dreizehn Büchern und sieben Intermezzos. Hamburg, Zuurich: Luchterhand, 1977. The German version is followed by page number from the Luchterhand edition. Women’s collective: female authorship in the novel Leben und Abenteuer... 73 adventures of Trobadora Beatrice de Dia, a woman troubadour, i.e. a trobairitz8, of twelfth-century Provence, who unhappy with the misogyny of the Middle Ages and unappreciated as a woman and artist in her time, seeks to escape the ‘medieval world of men’ and makes a pact with Persephone to sleep for eight hundred ten years. The basis for the figure of Beatrice is a historical figure of Comtessa de Dia, who lived in Provence in a late 12th century and was one of the most prolific of the trobairitz. Her works, of which only one survived, reflected traditional modes of courtly love from a woman’s perspective. In her songs she claimed to long to be in the arms of her love, the troubadour Raimbau d’Aurenga rather than those of her husband. Morgner appropriates the historical figure of de Dia, transporting her from the 12th to the 20th century. While Beatrice had been asleep for 810 years, Persephone and her mother Demeter, and the Beautiful Melusine had been working on rein- stating ancient matriarchal conditions. Beatrice chooses a third way, ‘which was to be neither patriarchal nor matriarchal but human’. The search for such equality is a driving force behind almost all of her actions. Beatrice’s adventures in modern times cover a five-year span – from May 6th 19689 to March 197310. In May 1968 Beatrice wakes up because highway construc- tion workers are about to demolish her castle. On her way to Paris she is raped and realizes that the misogyny she was trying to escape, still exists. In Paris she meets a GDR journalist Uwe Parnitzke who invites her to visit East Germany – ‘a land of miracles’ where women are truly free and emancipated. In the GDR employment prospects for female troubadours are not good, but she obtains work first as a circus performer, then as an operator of a poetry generator and finally as a writer. In Berlin Beatrice meets Laura Salman, a single mother, and an academic turned a trolley-car driver. Beatrice convinces her to become her minstrel. Aided by the magic of her sis- ter-in-law the Beautiful Melusine, who is half-human and half-dragon, Beatrice travels around the world hunting a unicorn, before returning to help Laura raise her baby son. During Beatrice’s travels, Laura writes stories for her and performs as minstrel in various factories around Berlin. Towards the end of the novel Beatrice fells out of a window and dies on March 12th 1968. The novel ends with The gospel of Valeska,

8 Trobairitz were Provençal female troubadours of the 12th century and the 13th century who wrote in Langue d’oc. The word trobairitz was first used in the 13th century romance Flamenca. It comes from the Provençal word trobar. Trobairitz wrote verses, and performed for the Occitan noble courts. They are exceptional in musical history as the first known female composers of Western secular music; all earlier known female composers wrote sacred music. The trobairitz were part of courtly society. The most important trobairitz are Alamanda Castelnau, Azalais de Porcairagues, Maria de Ventadorn, Tibors, Castelloza, Garsenda de Proença and the Comtessa de Dia. 9 French legislative election took place on June 23 and 30, 1968 to elect the 4th National Assembly of the Fifth Republic. ‘On May 6th 1968 30,000 demonstrators gathered in Paris and other cities to protest against the security police. They demanded that the police should be withdrawn from the Latin Quarter, the Sorbonne reopened and the arrested students released’. See: Tariq Ali and Susan Watkins. 1968. Marching in the Streets. 10 French legislative election took place on March 4 and 11, 1973 to elect the 5th National Assembly of the Fifth Republic. 74 Aleksandra Bednarowska which Laura reads as a revelation on the Trobadora’s burial day. The author of the gospel, Valeska Kantus was an East German woman scientist who undergoes a sex transformation and becomes a man. Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura has been seen as a feminist novel: it is about women and their relationships with one another, with men, with their children and parents, and with the state, society, housework, and history. It can also be viewed as a reflexive novel, about writing, the relationship between writers (and different aspects of each individual writer), socialist aesthetics, and the creative process. Finally it can be seen as a political novel, grounded (fantastic elements notwithstanding) in the politics and history of East Germany, and to a lesser extent of France. The four main figures in the novel are Beatrice de Dia, Laura Salman, the Beautiful Melusine and Valeska Kantus. The women are portrayed as writers whose works are included in the novel. Irmtraud Morgner herself is presented in the Resolutions (prologue to the novel) and in books one and four. Voices and points of view shift, meld, and separate throughout the novel. Authorship is often difficult to attribute, since characters (notably the Beautiful Melusine) present the work of others as their own. Even some of Beatrice’s stories are actually written by Laura. Melusine collects mostly newspaper clips, ‘copies’ parts of Morgner’s novel Rumba auf einen Herbst, and other works such as memoirs of Lenin’s wife, Krupskaya. Laura Salman writes about her own life, provides an outline of the novel, and creates stories which she reads as Beatrice’s minstrel to factory workers. Finally, Valeska Kantus is the author of Hadean stories and the gospel of Valeska. Morgner incorporates historical figures such as Aspasia11 or Raimbaut d’Aurenga12, East German writers such as Volker Braun, Sarah Kirsch or Paul Wiens, and mythological figures (Persephone, Demeter, Penthesilea) into the story in order to create her own version of literary tradition and history, in which women were active players. This tradition is for Morgner a neces- sary component of a writing process, which ultimately leads to female self-awareness. For her, Beatrice is a fighter, heretic, as important as Faust13. In these stories we see writing as an instrument by which women such as Laura, who becomes Beatrice’s minstrel, emancipates herself to a level from which they could think her way into independence: Women were not only excluded from educational institutions, they were also deprived of participation in informal networks that would allow them intellectual exchange, and response from audiences, etc. Finally, they lacked the resources to gain knowledge about their own history as women and about the cultural achievements of previous generations. Brecht’s poem about the reading worker. ‘Here the poet raises questions about creativ-

11 Aspasia was a Milesian woman from the 5th century B.C. who was famous for her involvement with the Athenian statesman Pericles. She is mentioned in the writings of Plato, Aristophanes, Xenophon, and other authors of the day. 12 A major 12th century troubadour, who contributed to the creation of trobar clus, or cryptic style, in troubadour poetry. 13 Irmtraud Morgner, interview, ‘Der weibliche Ketzer heißt Hexe. Gespräch mit Eva Kaufmann’, 48. Women’s collective: female authorship in the novel Leben und Abenteuer... 75

ity that are not found in books. About the slaves who built cities, for example, who left nameless but visible traces of their abilities: about men. I am waiting for the poet who could let a female worker who reads raise questions ...The slaves of the slaves, who could leave no visible traces of their abilities’. … Nobody who strives for greater things can do without an assistance of history. The certainty of being rooted. Self-consciousness that creates awareness of tradition. Pride. A nobleman who can lean on his family tree, for example, has an advantage over workers and women, who believe they are standing alone’14. Morgner contrasts female writers with ‘the famous poet B’, in support of some of her theses and her approach. The editor of Aufbau Verlag notes that B. (Brecht), notoriously incorporated the work of friends, colleagues, and lovers into his own, generally without properly crediting them: In contrast to most of his colleagues, he acquired not domesticated women but brilliant ones. Whom he put to work for him. Producing ideas and plans is a pleasure; carrying plans out is hard work. Thus the oeuvre of the famous poet, who surely did not have more ideas or plans than other great poets, turned out to be astonishingly extensive. He also had female collaborators who provided material for the production of ideas. And incidentally, he stole like a genius15. Much has been made of the novel’s use of a montage technique16 which is ex- plained in the novel: ‘The operative montage novel is an indestructible genre… short prose is in keeping with a normal woman’s life rhythm, which is socially and not biologically conditioned and constantly diverted by the interruptions of household responsibilities. Lack of time und unforeseeable interruptions force her to quick drafts’17. The story is narrated in 13 books with many parts only loosely connected to the central plot. The books are interrupted by seven intermezzos, which consist of

14 Morgner Irmtraud, 201–202. Der Dichter [Brecht] läßt drin nach den Schöpferischen fragen, die nicht in den Büchern verzeichnet wurden. Nach den städtebauenden Sklaven zum Beispiel, die namenlose aber sichtbare Spuren ihrer Tätigkeiten hinterließen: nach den Männern.... Ich warte auf den Dichter, der eine lesende Arbeiterin fragen lassen könnte. Nach den Sklaven der Sklaven, die keinerlei sichtbare Spuren ihrer Fähigkeiten hinterlassen konnten…Niemand, der sich müht, etwas Grösserres zu wollen, kann den Beistand der Geschichte entbehren. Diese Gewissheit der Verwurzelung. Selbstbewusstsein schaffendes Traditionsbewusstsein. Stolz. Ein Adliger, Arbeitern und Frauen, die allein zu stehen glauben, im Vorteil (194). 15 Ibidem, 175. Im Untersschied zu den meisten seiner Kollegen, legte er sich nicht domestizierte Frauen zu, sondern blitzgescheite. Die er für sich arbeiten ließ. Einfälle und Pläne produzieren ist eine Lust, Pläne ausführen harte Arbeit. So geriet das Werk des berühmten Dichters, der sicher nicht mehr Einfälle und Pläne hatte als andere grosse Dichter, erstaunlich umfangreich. Er hatte auch Mitarbeiterinnen, die Material zur Produktion von Einfällen ranschaffen. Er stahl übrigens genial. (169) 16 Severals researchers wrote about this novel. Among them Annemarie Auer, Patricia Herminghouse, Sonja Hilzinger, Marlis Gerhardt and Anneliese Stawström. 17 Morgner Irmtraud, 175–176. Der operative Montageroman ist ein unverwüstliches Genre… kurze Prosa [entspricht] dem gesellschaftlich, nicht biologisch bedingten Lebensrhytmus einer gewöhnlichen Frau, die ständig von haushaltbedingten Abhaltungen zerstreut wird. Zeitmangel und nicht berechenbare Störungen zwingen zu schnellen Würfen… (170). 76 Aleksandra Bednarowska large parts of Morgner’s previous novel Rumba auf einen Herbst, which was banned by the East German authorities, who also retained the manuscript. The books are made up of over one hundred short chapters18, many of which are pieces in their own right, some taken from other sources — poems, industrial ‘production-line’ reports, fairy-tales, newspapers, excerpts from GDR textbooks, interviews, letters, philo- sophical and political treatises, travelogues, along with science writings (on physics, artificial intelligence, nutrition, gerontology) and political speeches and announcements (on abortion, the Vietnam War). The montage provides variety and changes in pacing and it allows Morgner to contrast different genres and to approach ideas from several directions: fantastic metaphors, indirect references, and allusions, scientific prose, and political announcements. The use of different forms allows Morgner to fool censors and to capture the political situation and the hopes and absurdities to be found in East Germany at the time. Morgner explains the qualities of the montage novel when she has Laura offer such a work, to the Aufbau Verlag, one of the main publishing houses in East Germany. The editor in chief protests that what Laura proposes, ‘is no novel but a collection of stories’ (which don’t sell well). Laura insists that she is offering ‘the novel form of the future’ and that this form of the novel expects from the reader to be active: ‘A mosaic is more than the sum of its stones. In the composition they have a strange effect with and against each other under the eye of the viewer. Reading should be creative work: pleasure’19. Writing is ‘a daily, life-essential activity’ for Beatrice. She writes poetry, partially with help of a poetry generator, fairy tales, including one about Marie de Montpellier and a story, resembling Kafka’s Metamorphosis, about a Ludwig of Oranienburg, a tile layer who turns into a tree. In the second part of the novel Beatrice produces three stories called ‘bitterfeld fruits’, stories meant to fit the ideals of the Bitterfeld Weg, the cultural policy that unsuccessfully tried to bring the proletarian experience and the production of art closer together. (Beatrice’s first experience with Bitterfeld – riding past it in a train – comes in one of Morgner’s most overt criticisms of East German cultural policies: ‘after the Bitterfeld stop, overpowering odors had pen- etrated the train’20, giving Beatrice a headache). Beatrice tries all manner of literary production, her efforts are generally resounding successes; she is inducted into PEN,

18 Ibidem. Examples of chapter titles: ‘Flight on a dragon’s back’, followed by ‘Trobadora Beatrice’s self- criticism above the Luther city, Wittenberg’ ‘Love legend by Laura Salman, which Beatrice de Dia passes off as her own work to thirteen male and seven female employees of the Berlin S-Bahn’ ‘Wherein the reader learns what the Beautiful Melusine copied from Irmtraud Morgner’s novel Rumba for an Autumn into her 35th Melusinian book in 1964’. 19 Ibidem, 176. Ein Mosaik ist mehr als die Summe der Steine. In der Komposition arbeiten sie seltsam zu- und gegeneinander unter den Augen des Betrachters. Lesen soll schöpferische Arbeit sein: Vergnügen. (170). 20 Ibidem, 100. Nach dem Halteort Bitterfeld waren betäubende Gerüche in den Zug gedrungen (99). Women’s collective: female authorship in the novel Leben und Abenteuer... 77 and brings her art to the people, presenting her work to assemblies of workers at readings. At the Bitterfeld Conference of 1959 questions of cultural production were debated theoretically. The conference determined that only works, which served the interests and needs of the working class, would be promoted. In the years following this pronouncement, writers and other artists created a ‘new’ socialist realism avant- garde. Discourses on working class new socialist identity have found their way into literature, particularly into works of such writers as Dieter Noll or Paul Wiens21. The second conference in Bitterfeld took place in April 1964. Writers who rejected party recommendations and looked for other topics found themselves under increasing control from censorship and in many instances from the secret police. Morgner criticizes the state’s efforts to link literary activity to factory production by making Beatrice use a poetry generator and by having the East German poet Paul Wiens offer poems for sale at the Berlin Conference Center: V erses L yrics for T o A LL O rder L ife situations Are you having trouble in your collective? Are you on the wrong track? A PURE RHYME WILL ALWAYS HELP Even to cure lovesickness… Systematic schooling for emotions: Adults two lines for 1 mark Rhymed for double price, i.e. 2 marks22 Laura buys from him a canso of three stanzas, rhymed and fortified with magic spells, and signs the contract the Ganymed restaurant. Another example of work, which follows guidelines established by the Bitterfeld Conference is The Legend of Martha Lehmann. The legend consists of short diary entries written by Martha on ‘the backs of postal payment receipts, which, according to the printed form, are not to be used for messages for the recipient’23 and of short paragraphs written by Martha’s son Walther and by Beatrice. Martha’s entries start on March 8, 1945, but the son’s narrative describes her life before the war. On the surface it is a story of a working class woman, committed to the new German state and party politics. But between the lines we can read about the loneliness of Martha who until the end of her life grieved over the death of her beloved son Rudolf and her husband. She worked until her death, first as a railroad gate attendant, then at

21 Morgner Irmtraud, Emmerich, Wolfgang, 137. 22 Morgner Irmtraud, 275. V erse L yrik für / A uf A lle / B estellung L ebenslagen /Haben Sie Ärger im Kollektiv?/ Liegen Sie schief? /EIN REINER REIM HILFT IMMER! Sogar gegenLiebe- skummer…/ Systematische Erziehung der Gefühle: Für Erwachsene zwei Zeilen 1 Mark / Gereimt das Doppelte, mithin 2 Mark (264). 23 Ibidem, 364. Auf die Rückseiten von Postzahlkarteneinlieferungsscheinen, die laut Vordruck nicht zu Mitteilungen für den Empfänger zu benutzen sind (347). 78 Aleksandra Bednarowska a ticket office and finally at the age of eighty as a cleaning lady. Even though she faithfully performed her duties and was a local activist, the state officials provided her with more and more degrading positions, which she accepted, because she had no one in her life. Traveling constitutes another important experience of Beatrice’s life. Since travel outside of the Eastern bloc was restricted in East Germany and travel permits were granted only to citizens who reached the retirement age, the motive of travel can be viewed as a wish to become independent, the desire to explore the unknown, and to pursue the dreams. In the novel only women with magical powers – Melusine and Beatrice can cross the borders. Morgner breaks with one of the gender role stereotypes because, usually, men are the travelers and women the ones who wait for their return. Waiting was a woman’s duty, it was part of her role as a wife and a mother, and it was the means for the patriarchal society to control a woman’s life and body. The freedom of the traveler, and the right for female self-awareness through the experience of seeing other countries, and cultures was granted to men only. Traveling meant fulfillment of their desire for new experiences, for their self- actualization as individuals, for the opening of new frontiers. Traveling stands for freedom, for breaking barriers and for establishing independence. It means found- ing a community outside the domestic sphere, away from the power of male family members. For women, confined by gender restrictions and discouraged from active participation in the public sphere, the new independent social spheres have to be created. The creation of this independent sphere is a leading motive of this work. Beatrice, who expects the socialist paradise to provide her with the opportunity to work, finds that female troubadours are not in great demand. She is almost con- tinuously on the move: Odessa, Los Angeles, Split, Rome, Paris, Weimar, Berlin, and Karl-Marx-Stadt. She settles down briefly – in Paris, and later in Berlin – but most of her time is spent traveling and seeking. Though the East German scenes dominate, Beatrice herself actually spends less than half of the five years between 1968 and her death in the GDR. It takes her nearly two years to reach the promised land, and by January 1, 1971 she is off again, embarking on a quest in search of the mythi- cal unicorn, the one species still absent from the land of miracles – and one whose discovery could reshape the convictions of the entire nation. The trip abroad can be interpreted as an escape from a life in ‘a land of miracles’, from restrictions, difficulties of every day life, gender discrimination. Writers’ search for a female protagonist role model – a fictional heroine, an acting subject, rather then the passive object of love and desire by men – becomes part of that creation. Although writing was in itself a freeing experience for women, women writers often wrote in isolation and lacked moral and financial support:

Certainly it is possible for talented individuals to write in isolation and without the response of audience, but intellectual development depends on response, encouragement, Women’s collective: female authorship in the novel Leben und Abenteuer... 79

the ability to improve one’s work by criticism and the testing out of ideas in social interaction24. Even in ‘a land of the miracles’ women were discriminated against in their intellectual work and denied the right to institutional support such as universities, so- cieties, publishers, etc. Laura had to leave her university career because of lack of support: The happy mother dropped her daughter off at childcare in the morning, picked her up in the evening, washed diapers and all the other family laundry, cooked, shopped, cleaned the apartment, took the baby to the doctor, took care of her when she was sick. Uwe, a journalist, was often away on business trips at the time. Laura fell behind on the com- mentary she was writing for an edition her professor was working on…. Sometimes even dropped her daughter of at childcare with a slight fever in order to keep up with her teaching responsibilities. In 1958, eleven days before her first birthday, Juliane died of pneumonia. Soon thereafter Laura charged herself with lacking ideological clarity and asked to be transferred to production25. Being aware of the need to establish a support network for their intellectual work, women devoted their attention to establishing a public sphere for women, a set of intellectual networks and communities of women writers and readers that would help women overcome their isolation and make their writing marketable. The creation of the female audience was pivotal for the work of women writers and it was an important step toward building a community of women sharing ideas. Men readers, according to Morgner, view women as ‘monolithic’ and were not interested in reading their works: For in contrast to men, whom you understand as differentiated beings with differentiated needs, you think of women as monolithic. For which reason you trace all their cares, problems, and suffering back to one single defect. And this single optimal defect is of course yourselves. Gentlemen, bluntly stated: your middle part. – In the hope that my pragmatic explanation makes you, gentlemen, inclined to grant the right of existence not only to the works of the hunchbacked Herr Kant (Immanuel) and similar eminent authorities26. 24 Lerner, 223. 25 Morgner Irmtraud, 111. Die glückliche Mutter brachte die Tochter morgens in die Krippe, holte sie abends, wusch Windeln und auch sonst alle Wäsche der Familie, kochte, kaufte ein, säuberte die Wohnung, ging mit dem Kind zum Arzt, betreute es, wenn es krank war. Uwe war als Journalist damals häufig auf Dienstreisen. Laura geriet mit den Kommentaren in Verzug, die sie für eine Editionsarbeit des Professors zu liefern hatte…gab sogar mitunter die Tochter leicht fiebrig in der Krippe ab, um ihren Lehrveranstaltungen nachkommen zu können. 1958, elf Tage vor ihrem ersten Geburtstag, starb Juliane an Lungenentzündung. Wenig später bezichtigte sich Laura ideologischer Unklarheiten und bat um Delegierung in die Produktion (109). 26 Ibidem, 99. Denn im Gegensatz zum Mann, den Sie als differenziertes Wesen begreifen, das de- mentsprechend differenzierte Bedürfnisse hat, empfinden Sie Frauen als monolith. Weshalb Sie deren Kümmernissse, Schwierigkeiten oder Schmerzen alle auf einzigen mangel zurückführen. Und dieser einzige optimale Mangel sind selbstverständlich Sie, geehrte Herren, brutal gesagt: Ihr Mittelstück. – In der Hoffnung, dass meine pragmatische Erklärung Sie, geehrte Herren geneigt macht, nicht nur in den 80 Aleksandra Bednarowska

Showalter argues that women have constituted a subculture within the frame- work of a larger society, and have been unified by values, conventions and experiences. In many instances, however, each generation of women writers was forced to rediscover the past anew, because the predecessors’ work disappeared without a trace. Women writers, united by their roles as daughters, wives and mothers, and by legal and economic constrain, were aware of each other’s works and showed a covert solidarity. They were also aware of the fact that their readers would both read their works ‘between the lines and refrain from betraying what they decipher’27. Beatrice de Dia, being the female troubadour, became a role model for others in these endeavors. She broke many societal barriers: she did not restrict her life to her domestic duties only, but instead wrote poetry and performed. At the end, however, she came to the realization that: ‘A medieval minnesinger of female sex is histori- cally conceivable. A medieval love poet of female sex is not’28. She recognized ways in which patriarchal society institutionalizes women’s oppression and pointed out those theories about the feminine character of the female sex made discrimination against women possible. Women writers always believed that their gender influenced their writing. Lerner brought this point to modern readers in her groundbreaking book The Creation of Feminist Consciousness. She argues: the mind of man or woman is located in a sexed body ... The male and the female poet live in gendered society, that is, one in which the societal definitions of behavior and expectations appropriate to the sexes are embedded in every institution of society, in its thought, its language, its cultural product … And finally, the male or female person of talent lives with a different relationship to history … female voice and female culture can be seen not as attributes of sex, but as products of gendered history29. Furthermore, Lerner argued that women had to build their own sphere in which they could express their feelings and share their experiences. They had to build their own networks with other members of society and were able to establish connections through letters, discussions, and their writing. Cixious views the process of writing as a creation of ‘a new being who won’t restrain ‘her’. Through writing, she argued, a woman gained space to talk about questions that haunt her mind: Sometimes I think I began writing in order to make room for the wandering question that haunts my soul … to give, seek, touch, call, bring into the world a new being who won’t restrain me30..

Wrken des buckligen Herrn Kant (Immanuel) und ähnlicher Koryphäen eine Existenzberechtigung zu- zusprechen (98). 27 Showalter, Elaine, 19. 28 Morgner Irmtraud, 30. Eine mittelalterliche Minnesängerin ist historisch denkbar. Eine mittelalterliche Liebessängerin nicht (33). 29 Lerner, Gerda, 168. 30 Cixious, Hélène, 7. Women’s collective: female authorship in the novel Leben und Abenteuer... 81

In their literary works, the protagonists of Morgner’s novel, the four women writers described their exclusion from participation in the public sphere, and the process of building a women’s community. Fiction was the only means to propagate these ideas among women. Laura Salman, Beatrice de Dia, Valeska Kantus and the Beautiful Melusine talk not only about their exclusion from public sphere and the creation of a female community, but also about the development of feminist consciousness. The fictional heroines, faced with isolation and oppression in patriarchal society, explore different ways for building a women’s community. The protagonists’ search for their own identities as modern women gave the writer an opportunity to explore women’s feelings and desires.

Bibliography

Achberger, K., Karen R., Achberger F. 1978. ‘Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatriz as Chronicled by Her Minstrel Laura’. In: New German Critique, No. 15 (Autumn), p. 121–146 Auer, A. 1990. ‘Trobadora unterwegs oder Schulung in Realismus’ In: Irmtraud Morgner. Texte, Daten, Bilder, ed. M. Gerhardt, Frankfurt am Main: Luchterhand Cixious, H. 1991. ‘Coming to Writing’ and other Essays, Cambridge: Harvard University Press Emde, S. von der, 2004. Entering History. Feminist Dialogues in Irmtraud Morgner Prose, Bern: Peter Lang Verlag Emmerich, W. 1996. Kleine Literaturgeschichte der DDR. Erweiterte Neuausgabe, Leipzig: Gustav Kiepenheuer Verlag Gerhardt, M. 1990. ‘Geschichtsklitterung als weibliches Prinzip’, In: Irmtraud Morgner. Texte, Daten, Bilder, ed. M. Gerhardt, Frankfurt am Main: Luchterhand Herminghouse, P. 2003. Schreiben in gewendeten Verhältnissen: Ostdeutsche Autorinnen in historisher Sicht. In: Frauen Literatur Geschichte. Schreibende Frauen vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart. Eds. H. Gnüg and R. Möhrmann, Stuttgart: Suhrkamp, 477–496 Hilzinger, Sonja. 1985. ‘Als ganzer Mensch zu leben...’Emanzipatorische Tendenzen in der neueren Frauen-Literatur der DDR’. Frankfurt am Main: Bern; New York: Peter Lang Lerner, G. 1993. The Creation of Feminist Consciousness, New York, Oxford: Oxford Uni- versity Press Morgner, I. 1998. Das heroische Testament. Ein Roman in Fragmenten, München: Luchterhand Morgner, I. interview, 1990 ‘Der weibliche Ketzer heißt Hexe. Gespräch mit Kaufmann, Eva’. In: ‘Irmtraud Morgner. Texte, Daten, Bilder, ed. Marlis Gerhardt, Frankfurt am Main: Luchterhand Morgner, I. 1977. Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatritz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura. Roman in dreizehn Büchern und sieben Intermezzos, Hamburg, Zurich: Luchterhand 82 Aleksandra Bednarowska

Morgner, I. 2000. The Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatrice as Chronicled by her Minstrel Laura. A Novel in Thirteen Books and Seven Intermezzos, translated by Jeanette Claussen, Lincoln, London: University of Nebrasca Press Scott, J.W. 1988. Gender and the Politics of History, New York: Columbia University Press Showalter, E. 1999. A Literature of Their Own. British Women Novelists from Brontë to Lessing. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton UP Stawström, A. 1987. Studien zur Menschenwerdungsthematik im I.Morgners ‘Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura’. Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell International Tariq A. and Watkins S. 1998. 1968. Marching in the Streets. NY: The Free Press Westgate, G. 2002. Strategies under Surveillance: Reading Irmtraud Morgner as a GDR writer, Amsterdam: Rodopi Woolf, V. 2000. ‘Women and Fiction’. In: Gender. Ed. A. Tripp, Houndmills, Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave, 18–29.

Wspólnota kobiet: autorstwo kobiet w powieści Irmtraud Morgner Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura

Autorka stawia serię pytań dotyczących innowacyjnej techniki pisarstwa zaprezentowa- nego w wydanej w 1974 roku w NRD powieści Irmtraud Morgner Leben und Abenteuer der Trobadora Beatriz nach Zeugnissen ihrer Spielfrau Laura. Powieść jest napisana w formie kolażu przez cztery protagonistki: Beatrice de Dia, średniowieczną trubadurę z Prowansji, która przybywa do NRD, do kraju cudów, w którym kobiety nie są dyskryminowane, pięk- ną Melusinę, pół kobietę, pół smoka, która walczy o równouprawnienie, motorniczą ko- lejki miejskiej w Berlinie Laurę Salman i Valeskę Kantus, naukowca, która przeistacza się w mężczyznę. Ta nowoczesna forma powieści odpowiada rytmowi pracy pisarek, gdzie proces tworzenia jest ciągle przerywany obowiązkami domowymi, od których kobiety, nawet w kraju cudów, nie mogą uciec.