Abstract:

Autobiographical aspects permeate Koeppen’s entire literary production, with the fragments of one single character splintered into the novels larger texts, which are dominated by a great unique theme: Koeppen’s ‘Lebensroman’, his literary existence, his memories, his relationship with himself and with the world. In the 1950s Koeppen intensified his approach to the autobiographical perspective above all for intimate and personal experiences. The selected texts from these years (included in the collection Auf demPhantasieroß) document the variety of his narration, however based on his private experiences and his intimate world. The analysis of this work is useful not only to extract information about the characters and the themes of Koeppen’s literary production, but also to lighten the subjective processes of his writing. The present article will analyse Koeppen’s poetics and existence: the representation of the theme of social and psychological exclusion, the theme of madness and of extreme emotions; the conflict between desires and cruel reality and, thus, the escape into imaginary kingdoms (for example in Vor dem Film) or foreign countries (Tanger, Petra); the contrast between the memories of happy times in the past and a present time of suffering; the biographical and literary motif of melancholy (Elisenhein, Der schwarze Ritter); the portrayal of women as ‘Kinderfrauen’ or as moody and angry women (for example in ArmeDiotima) as products of the influence of Koeppen’s beloved women (his first sad love, Sybille Schloß, and his wife, Marion Ulrich); the centrality of Eros in human experience: from onanism to homosexuality, from the nudity of the female body to (sexy) photography - in particular, he demonstrates how erotic symbols are associated with sensory perceptions as well as the importance of mythology not only in his work, but also in his perception of reality, for example in Das Kleid der Frau Prometheus and Der Sarkophag der Phädra. Erzählung. 

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