No-Woman’s Land of German Literary History

The history of German literature starts from 8th/9th century AD with the first likely literary composition “Hildebrandslied”  and “Merseburger Zauberspruche”,  in Early Middle Old German of this epoch. Dr. D. H. Green’s work on women readers of medieval Europe (700-1500 AD) shows women’s commitment to reading in Germany, France and England. The women readers from different social strata actually contributed to the development of literature in Europe. Question is, did the women of that era confined themselves only in reading and never engaged in writing? 

Let’s take the case of Germany. If women authors also contributed in the development of German literature along with their male counterparts over last few centuries, then why do we find so few names of women authors in the German literary history? In fact, the unfortunate part of German literary history is – we are able to trace women’s contribution only partially.

One reason behind this is obviously the paternalistic form of society. Literary history is nothing but a part of the entire socio-cultural history. When the social history is written in a paternalistic form of a society, it is more inclined to glorify the ‘manly’ contributions rather than the ‘feminine’ one. Therefore, the role of the women authors were kind of ignored in the process of keeping the literary history as well. This could be one reason why we identify “Minnesängerinnen” (women minstrel singers) only in 13^th century AD though they might have sung in Old High German also.

Later Middle age religious “prudence” used to practice burning of literature when any of these works was considered against the interest of church and the particular class of people associated to it, irrespective of any gender bias. In the one hand, names of women writers started appearing from this period, i.e. 12th/13th century AD while convents and monasteries started educating nuns, but on the other, content of the writing had to be permitted by religious institutions. Any author, stamped as ‘heretic’ did not have chance to survive; their manuscripts faced the same fate. Some of the women authors were wrapped under their mystic veils. Among them were Gertrud von Helfta, Hildegard von Bingen and Mechthild von Magdeburg, many of the last mentioned one’s writing were burnt. Starting from 17/18^th century, women authors were being published with greater importance; but yet, social class played a big role.  

The mindset that ignored women authors while compiling the history of literary activities can be found even in the writings of Georg Gottfried Gervinus (1805-1871), the father of the German literary history. Creativity and genius were considered to be “manly” qualities even in his 19^th century research work. Economic and biological reasons were shown as the basis of women’s passive role in society and that was supported on moral and ideological grounds. Women were considered to be “born readers” to praise ‘manly talents’ rather than becoming “significant writers” themselves.

Another reason of ignoring women writers was probably political. 19th century German speaking parts of Europe were already in the process of unification and that obviously needed some masculine power in forefront. Nationalism was the symbol of this masculine power and literature was considered to be successful only when it was able to fulfil this “national” interest; in other words, literature took leading role in creating the “national” spirit as long as the German nation state was under consideration. As a result, the part of literature which did not directly participate in “nation building” was not considered to be of any importance.

Between 18^th century-1^st half of the 20^th century, literary activities were supposed to be supported by artist’s forums or circles. If we analyse the reason behind widespread acceptance of the famous authors before or during this time, we find fulfilling certain prerequisites was almost mandatory for a person to be considered as an acceptable author. They had to be formally highly educated and professionally well-established, practitioners of cultural and scientific studies, renowned social and political reformers and nevertheless, taking important role in the world of fine arts revolution. Both Goethe (1749-1832) and Schiller fulfilled all these criteria. Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803) was born in a poor household but satisfied education and other criteria to their fullest extent. Moreover, he was one ardent preacher of patriotism: "he who has lost his patriotic spirit has lost himself and the whole worlds about himself" – was his view which also became a popular quote. All of Klemens Brentano (1778 –1842), Georg Büchner (1813 –1837), E.T.A Hoffmann (1776–1822) and others famous authors were all standard-tested this way. On the other hand, due to the prevalent social role-determination, many of the women authors of the same period could not pass these standards. Women hailing from other than the nobility had to take care of only families, were not ‘educated’ in universities, artistically not ‘fine’ and not proficient in science and technologies; naturally lost the chance of being considered as anything significant in the world of literature.

The aesthetical subjectivity developed in post-Gervinus era, which was dominant also in 2^nd half of the 19^th century.  This had no lesser impact as a prerequisite of acceptable literature. Aesthetics in arts and literature was attached to ornate styles which were considered to be an attribute to excellence. By their non-association to university studies, women authors obviously didn’t develop the skill to use ornate styles – compositions were more spontaneous expressions without an understanding of “target-reader”. 

The following lines of  Clara Müller (1861-1905) was probably too direct to be acceptable as carrying ‘fine test’.

“-Und hundert Tage und noch vielmehr

Der Herd ist kalt und die Lade leer.

Am Fest der Liebe kein Jubelton –

Und die Friedensbotschaft ward Hohn, wardHohn!

Schwer hängt der Himmel, wie schiefer grau,

Über den Dächern von Crimmitschau”

Translation:

 -And thousand days and still more

The stove was cold and the lade empty;

None was playing jubeltone in the feast of love –

The message of peace was a joke – only a joke!

The slate gray sky was hanging above,

Over the roofs of Crimmitschau...

Understandable, how the rationale helped in the growth of an idea that women are incapable of creating anything of high aesthetic value.

In the beginning of 20^th century, i.e. post WWI, women’s position in society started changing, still the post war requirement of ‘masculine’ contribution in reconstructing the nation kept the women author  on backstage only. Nazi regime rules anyway had catastrophic impact on German art and culture; there was no reason for great literary development during this period – neither men nor women could contribute to the fullest extent, though their works during this time created a distinct category called war literature\ holocaust literature. Only post WWII Germany, even though politically divided into parts, brought scope of free speech without gender bias. Obviously, German women authors in this period used the scope well to play significant role in modern German literature.