THE EDUCATION OF THE PROTAGONIST AS READER IN THE EARLY BILDUNGSROMAN by Zsuzsa Horváth B.A. equivalent, German Literature, University of Augsburg, Germany, 1999 M.A., Germanic Languages and Literatures, University of Pittsburgh, 2001 M.A., Hungarian Language and Literature, University of Szeged, Hungary, 2006 Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Arts and Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Pittsburgh 2009 UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH ARTS AND SCIENCES This dissertation was presented by Zsuzsa Horváth It was defended on October 2, 2009 and approved by Attilio Favorini, PhD, Professor John Lyon, PhD, Associate Professor Sabine von Dirke, PhD, Associate Professor Dissertation Advisor: Clark Muenzer, PhD, Associate Professor ii Copyright © by Zsuzsa Horváth 2009 iii THE EDUCATION OF THE PROTAGONIST AS READER IN THE EARLY BILDUNGSROMAN Zsuzsa Horváth, PhD University of Pittsburgh, 2009 The dissertation investigates reading behaviors in Goethe’s Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre (1795-96), Tieck’s Franz Sternbalds Wanderungen (1798/1843) and Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen (1802) within the framework of the history of reading and book production. Social and technological pressures during the latter part of the eighteenth century resulted in a re- definition and re-invention of the reading process as the modern book was being “invented.” New themes and genres appeared on the literary horizon that had as a goal the education of a new kind of reader. Goethe’s, Tieck’s, and Novalis’s novels, which were products of the paradigm shift in reading, did not, however, just embrace changes that were already in place. By engaging in the contemporary discussion about new and old reading behaviors, each of these works promoted a new kind of reading that in one way or another maintained older forms while still recognizing the revolution that the irreversible technological advances had initiated. Drawing on discussions by Engelsing and Schön on the history of reading, the dissertation shows that the three novels record new reading strategies by analyzing the epochal changes in terms of a three-fold movement from intensive to extensive reading, reading aloud to reading silently, and communal to solitary reading. Additionally, it shows how the novels investigate the relationship between the reception of textual and visual artifacts and, thereby, contribute to the contemporary discourse on changes in the aesthetic status of image and text. iv The three novels explore these shifts from different angles. The Lehrjahre thus analyzes the transition from intensive to extensive reading by placing these modalities between reading in a community and reading in solitude. Sternbald, less concerned with the complexities of this transition, focuses on the communal aspect of reading by exploring how a revitalized orality can affect a rapidly changing reading culture. Ofterdingen, by contrast, reflects on the inherent contradiction of efforts to enhance reading culture by restoring orality. For Novalis, the emergence of extensive solitary readers was final and irreversible. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................................... VIII PREFACE ...................................................................................................................................... 1 1.0 BOOKS, READERS, AND LITERATURE .............................................................. 3 1.1 BOOK PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION ............................................... 5 1.2 READERSHIP ................................................................................................... 11 1.2.1 Intensive versus Extensive Reading ............................................................. 11 1.2.2 Educational Reforms ..................................................................................... 14 1.2.3 The Birth of a New Readership .................................................................... 18 1.3 INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF LITERATURE AND THE BILDUNGSROMAN ........................................................................................................... 25 2.0 WILHELM MEISTERS LEHRJAHRE .................................................................... 32 2.1 BETWEEN INTENSIVE AND EXTENSIVE READING ............................ 34 2.1.1 The Theater as a Place for Reading ............................................................. 35 2.1.2 Biographies ..................................................................................................... 51 2.2 SOCIAL FORMS OF READING .................................................................... 59 2.2.1 The Reading Community and the Private Reader ..................................... 60 2.2.2 Reading to Others .......................................................................................... 64 2.2.3 A New Community? ...................................................................................... 71 vi 2.3 STORYTELLING AND WRITING AS A FUNCTION OF READING ..... 74 2.4 READING GENRES ......................................................................................... 81 2.5 TEXTUAL AND VISUAL READING ............................................................ 86 3.0 FRANZ STERNBALDS WANDERUNGEN ............................................................. 95 3.1 ART AND READING ..................................................................................... 101 3.2 READING AND LISTENING........................................................................ 111 3.2.1 Intensive Reading ........................................................................................ 118 3.2.2 Oral Culture in Tieck’s Sixteenth Century ............................................... 121 3.2.3 Biographies ................................................................................................... 139 3.2.4 Painter, Reader, and Writer ....................................................................... 145 4.0 HEINRICH VON OFTERDINGEN ........................................................................ 150 4.1 STORYTELLING ........................................................................................... 155 4.2 BIOGRAPHIES ............................................................................................... 160 4.3 FROM CONVERSATION THROUGH READING TO WRITING ......... 186 5.0 THE EARLY BILDUNGSROMAN AND READING ........................................... 199 BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................... 216 vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am thankful to my professors, colleagues, family, and my husband for their encouragement and support during the writing of my dissertation. This project allowed me to grow intellectually, professionally, and personally, and I am grateful to the University of Pittsburgh and the Department of German for their continued support. I am grateful to Professor Mariolina Salvatori (University of Pittsburgh) for her enthusiasm and guiding questions. I am especially thankful to my dissertation advisor, Professor Clark Muenzer, and my committee members, Professors Attilio Favorini, John Lyon, and Sabine von Dirke, for their commitment, guidance, and support. Their encouragement and enthusiasm for my project were invaluable. I would also like to offer my special thanks the Goethe Society of North America for selecting my project for their first workshop on writing a Goethezeit dissertation. I was honored to receive their Gloria Flaherty Prize to support my participation in this project. I owe much gratitude to the participating scholars, Professor Matt Erlin (Washington University of St. Louis), Susan E. Gustafson (University of Rochester) and Karin L. Schutjer (University of Oklahoma), as well as to the other prize winners, Catherine Sprecher (University of Chicago) and Jason Wilby (University of California, Irvine). Their willingness to read chapters of my dissertation and their subsequent comments provided many helpful insights. viii PREFACE “Hier ist Ihr Lehrbrief, sagte der Abbé, beherzigen Sie ihn, er ist von wichtigem Inhalt. Wilhelm nahm ihn auf, eröffnete ihn und las: Lehrbrief’” (FA, Vol. 1/9, 874). With this certificate, the protagonist of Goethe’s Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre (1795-96) begins to read his own life story—the very story the novel has just told. I have often returned to this scene to question why, during this crucial moment in his protagonist’s life and Bildung, Goethe presents him reading. I have come to see the scene as a paradigmatic site of reading, connecting Wilhelm Meister and other novels like it, such as Tieck’s Franz Sternbalds Wanderungen (1798) and Novalis’s Heinrich von Ofterdingen (1802), to the history of reading. All three novels construct environments that emphasize their protagonists’ educations as readers. Wilhelm reads throughout the novel. His reading in the Hall of Past is paradigmatic because it is the culminating scene of his education as a reader. Similarly, Franz’s and Heinrich’s education consists of reading various types of texts throughout the novels. In this dissertation, I argue that Bildung in all three novels aims at the construction of a new reader as a significant factor in the emergence of literature as an institution. To describe the formation of this reader, however, reading in these novels often encompasses more than just written texts. Wilhelm’s,