Kleist. Vom Schreiben in der Moderne ed. Dieter Heimböckel (review)

The eight essays in this volume stem from a symposium held at the University of Luxemburg to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Kleist’s death. Although the symposium was a cooperative venture between literary scholars and the Théâtre National du Luxembourg, only one of the essays—Bart Philipsen’s excellent analysis of Robert Guiskard—focuses on a drama; many of the other contributors focus on performative aspects of Kleist’s prose. As the title of the volume indicates, all the essays in the collection attempt to situate Kleist as a protomodernist author.

In his brief foreword, Dieter Heimböckel states that the modernity of Kleist’s work resides in its transgression of moral and behavioral norms (8). He rejects epochal conventions that confine die Moderne to a period between 1880 and 1920/30 and instead argues that modernism began “um 1800” (9). In his subsequent article, “Wie vom Zufall geführt: Kleists Griffel,” Heimböckel refines this position, asserting that Kleist derives his modernity “aus den Arsenalen der Tradition” by employing a “Praxis der Verschiebung” (29, 36). Covering ground already well trodden in the 1980s and 1990s, he then examines the role of anagrams in Kleist’s writings and shows how these orthographic and semiotic displacements reveal “das Ungewohnte im Gewohnten und das Andere bzw. Fremde im Bekannten” (36). Heimböckel’s readings are thoughtful and nuanced—as are all the articles in this collection—yet they are oddly reliant on deconstructive theory. Although footnotes throughout the volume reflect up-to-date research, Heimböckel’s article sometimes sounds like it was written a quarter century ago. Similarly, Jennifer Pavlik (re)creates a de Manian reading of “Über das Marionettentheater,” citing de Man frequently and reaching long-familiar conclusions: “Vor allem bleibt der Mensch der Sprache ausgeliefert und in das trügerische Reich der Zeichen verwiesen” (59). She then examines Kleist’s “Über die allmähliche Verfertigung der Gedanken beim Reden” through a Lacanian lens and finds, unsurprisingly, that human consciousness is structured linguistically (67). In a similarly retrograde theoretical vein, Achim Geisenhanslüke argues that Der Findling performs a “Dekonstruktion” of Enlightenment notions of family (131).

Other essays in the volume also draw from deconstructive theory, but do so more nimbly and reach more original conclusions. A high point of the collection is Bart Philipsen’s “Kleist oder Das Theater des Unvermögens,” a study of the Guiskard fragment. This article builds power slowly, first comparing Guiskard to Hölderlin’s Der Tod des Empedokles, and then to Kleist’s “Empfindungen vor Friedrichs Seelandschaft.” Philipsen hits his stride when he considers Guiskard as a “Meta-Drama” that plays out on the fringes of the representable (84). His discussion of Kleist’s use of the stage is particularly fascinating. Building on a keen analysis by Roland Reuß, Philipsen states that the well-ordered, schematic setting of Guiskard (ocean, hill, encampment, fires) initially seems to be structured allegorically, just as the play initially seems to be a “dramatisch-dialogische Auseinandersetzung zwischen Machthabern und Volk” (86). This systematic arrangement breaks down, however. The ocean forms a permeable background, while the fires in the foreground, smoking with pungent herbs, blur the boundary between stage and audience, enveloping viewers in a protective (or pestilential!) cloud. From this perspective the play becomes “ein phantasmagorisches Geisterballet und gestisches Körpertheater am Nullgrad der Sprache” (86). While Philipsen occasionally lapses into formulaic deconstructive parlance—e.g., the “Allegorie der Pest” becomes a “Pest der Allegorie” (88)—this reading of Guiskard contributes significantly to our understanding of Kleist’s use of the stage as a structural element, his eradication of the “fourth wall,” and the perspectival “anamorphoses” (86) he presents to readers and audience members.

Alexander Honold’s essay on Der Zweikampf, “Das Gottesurteil und sein Publikum,” sets forth two main arguments that, in the end, do not fully coalesce but are both interesting in their own right. The first concerns the arrow...