Theodor Fontane. Realismus, Redevielfalt, Ressentiment Von Norbert Mecklenburg (review)

The first thing to know about this book is that it is an updated and expanded version of Mecklenburg's 1998 monograph Theodor Fontane. Romankunst der Vielstimmigkeit (Suhrkamp). This new book includes all eight original chapters from the 1998 volume. The revisions include many reformulated sentences, some new analysis, and updated references to more recent secondary literature, but one can still see that, section for section and often sentence for sentence, these are the same essays that were published in the earlier book. But this new Theodor Fontane monograph is not simply a revised edition of an earlier work. It also includes five new chapters, and these additional essays expand the scope in two main ways, first by examining "Fontanes Inszenierung von Inter- und Transkulturellem," and second, by exploring Fontane's "unbestreitbaren Antisemitismus" and its implications for the contemporary reception of his works (x).

The new subtitle terms indicate where Mecklenburg's recent work on Fontane has taken him. The first term, Realismus, reflects the ongoing goal of examining Fontane's practice and conception of realism through an approach that seeks a middle ground between close textual analysis and a broader socio-cultural perspective. Redevielfalt refers at least in part to Mikhail Bakhtin's theory of dialogism, which informs Mecklenburg's critical approach in both of his Fontane books. It also harks back to his 1998 work's focus on Vielstimmigkeit in Fontane's novels. The third term, Ressentiment, indicates the new book's most noteworthy contribution—namely, a deep engagement with the literary documents of Fontane's anti-Semitic impulses.

Mecklenburg is a sensitive and thoughtful reader of Fontane, and his analyses have held up well over the decades since their original publication. His readings are insightful enough that they warrant revising and reprinting in the twenty-first century, which is due in no small part to a critical approach that is finely attuned to the rhetorical intricacies of Fontane's narrative style. A prime example of this comes through his close reading of the statement, "Weiber weiblich, Männer männlich" from Effi Briest (Chapter Seven in the Suhrkamp book, Chapter Six in this one). The statement comes from Effi, but Mecklenburg unpacks it as a multidimensional speech act, for she cites here one of her father's oft-repeated sentences, who in turn is citing one of the maxims of Prussian gender norms. To whom does the phrase's sentiment belong, to Effi, to her father, to Prussian social discourse? More difficult still, should one take it as a mere platitude, reproduced from a critical distance by an ironizing narrative stance, or rather as a deliberate reflection of Fontane's own views? Few interpreters can match Mecklenburg's skill when it comes to sifting through the complex rhetorical layers of passages such as this one. He is able to draw the reader's attention, in his words, to "das Ineinander von eigener und fremder Rede," as well as the "osmotische Offenheit des Fontaneschen Erzählens, als Stoffwechsel von Romansprache und Gesellschaftssprache, als Dialogizität" (141).

Some might wonder why Mecklenburg chose to package his new work on Fontane together with his older essays. Why not publish a shorter stand-alone monograph dedicated solely to the intercultural and anti-Semitic aspects of Fontane's writing? One reason could be the continuity of methodology between the old and the new. The newly written chapters carry forward the critical approach—drawing on Bakhtin and Pierre Bourdieu—that was developed in the earlier essays and extend it to transcultural views of otherness, nation, and stereotypical thought. And as the Effi Briest analysis should demonstrate, Mecklenburg's approach positions him extremely well to sort out the thorny relationships among character speech, narrative voice, and authorial attitude. The continuity of critical perspective is generally a strength in this volume, although in Chapter Eight, titled "Denn die Chinesen sind doch auch Menschen," it also presents as something of a limitation. Although the chapter treats transcultural and...