KITSCH IN THE PROSE WORKS OF THEODOR STORM

DX188423_1_001.tifby
Philosophy in the Department of Germanic Studies
University of Sheffield.
KITSCH IN THE, PROSE WORKS OF THEODOR STORM.
The twofold purpose of this study is to clarify, on the one hand,
the question of literary evaluation in general and of kitsch in particular,
and, on the other, to analyse the prose works of Theodor Storm in the
light of the theories of literary evaluation thus established.
It therefore follows that the investigation falls into two main
sections. The first is in essence theoretical. It consists of seven
chapters, in which are examined the terminology, etymology and history
of literary evaluation; the many different approaches to tackling and
understanding the problem of kitsch (pedagogic, socio—economic, political,
religious, moral, philosophical etc.); kitsch in its relationship to art;
kitsch in literature and elsewhere (kitsch of both style and philosophy);
kitsch and the consumer, especially the female consumer; kitswh's causes
and functions under a variety of political and socipa regimeA4.and,
lastly, the possible dangers of kitsch and the remedies suggested to
help counteract it.
The second section commences with a survey of prominent trends in
Storm research old and new, followed by an exploration of Storm's awareness
of and relationship to his reading public and to his publishers, and the
effect on his work of the demands of family finances. Three chapters are
devoted specifically to Storm's wide—ranging techniques for appealing
to his reading public, and four to one of the most important aspects of
his work in relation to kitsch, the women figures and love and marriage
in the 'Novellen'. Three more are given over to problems in his works,
with particular emphasis on the function of social critic now widely
claimed for him. Two chapters deal with Storm's literary aims, both in
respect of artistic achievement and popular acclaim, how far he was
successful in achieving them, and what shortcomings threatened to diminish
the literary value of his works. Finally, there is a chapter on Storm's
reception under various regimes and how prevailing ideological factions
adapted the works for their own use, whilst Storm's reception in the
immediate post—war era and in the present day is the subject of the
conclusion.
CONTENTS
'Kitsch Style' - Rgsumg of Approaches 41
Etymology - Some Historical Aspects - Nazi Kitsch 64
Marxism and Kitsch - Pedagogic Aspects - Mass Culture 82
Causes and Functions 98
Dangers and Remedies 118
Theodor Storm's Women Figures - The 'Femme Fragile' 343
Love and Marriage - I 369
Love and Marriage - II 390
Love and Marriage - III 410 %
Problems in Storm - I (Nobility, Religion, Race) 439
Problems in Storm - II (Heredity, Alcoholism, Illness, Death, Politics, War) 463
Problems in Storm III (History, Social Criticism, Transience) 483
Theodor Storm's Alias and Shortcomings - I 51b
Theodor Storm's Aims and Shortcomings - II 530
Storm - Reception and Ideology 559
Conclusion - Theodor Storm Post-War 596
Notes 614
Bibliography 718
1
INTRODUCTION
The title of this study, "Kitsch in the Prose Works of Theodor
Storm", is to some degree misleading in that not only is a good half of
it devoted to a wide—ranging analysis of the problem of kitsch, but
because it suggests that the sole aim is to denigrate an author whose
works by no means belong exclusively to those lower echelons of literary
production implied by the word 'kitsch'. Nevertheless, this study does
tackle the problem of aesthetic evaluation and 'Rangordnung', and that
probably to a degree greater than is normally inherent in academic critical
investigations. It is always possible to question the validity of imposing
a scheme of values on works of literature which, whilst they may make
no pretensions to the status of art, may perform some function in moral,
political, social or other spheres (which does not imply that a work of
literature cannot combine the aesthetic along with other functions).
However, in cases where an author claims to have produced a work or works
deserving in his opinion of the status of art, it is perhaps justifiable
to enquire into the legitimacy of this claim. This is very relevant as
far as Theodor Storm is concerned in the light of attestations which he
himself repeatedly makes in his correspondence with family, friends and
fellow—authors, regarding his own literary production.
It is the purpose of the initial section of the present study to
explore the many different aspects of the kitsch problem, in order to
help formulate some of the precepts upon which the later assessment of
Theodor Storm is to be founded. As an author, the latter has constantly
been a topic for literary criticism, and interest in him has perceptibly
increased in the last twenty or thirty years. However, despite the mass
of critical material, there is as yet no study which focusses on the
difficulties associated with kitsch and kitsch criticism with specific
reference to Theodor Storm. This is surprising in view of the fact that
2
quite a number of critics have recognised definite leanings towards a
sentimental 'Weltanschauung' and an ofttimes sentimental expression of
it in his works. Moreover, it is precisely this problematical angle
which renders Storm suitable for a diagnosis of this nature - his works
are particularly challenging in that they could be said to lie on many
occasions in the peripheral areas between kitsch and art, and it could
be for this very reason that many have tended to overpraise him, as an
over-reaction, perhaps, to his obvious sentimentality.
His case is relevant, too, in that it illustrates both something of
the relationship between the author and his reading public and that between
the author and his publisher in the nineteenth century, a formative era
for modern literary practice and literary production, above all for the
mass society, which is evidently essential to the problem of kitsch. It
is for this reason that the present study concentrates mainly on the prose
rather than the poetic works, for generally speaking, poetry will always
enjoy a smaller and probably more select audience, so that it is less
easy to illustrate its effects on a mass public and the techniques it
employs to achieve this. Storm's extensive correspondence demonstrates
his consciousness of his readership and some of his attitudes towards
the literary practice of the day. If his works are designed to achieve
public sympathy, how this is done, and how far the works accord with
Storm's avowed artistic credo, is revealed in his correspondence and
elsewhere, as well as in the works themselves.
It is the aim of the following investigation, then, to assist in
establishing a clearer picture of the phenomenon 'kitsch', as well as
illustrating it by recourse to a particular example, Theodor Storm.
3
JUSTIFICATIONS AND TERMINOLOGY
Prior to embarking upon an examination of the works of Theodor
Storm, it is necessary to look at the subject of kitsch and the present
IForschungsstand' in order to determine whether unambiguous and feasible
theories can be brought to bear upon this "Kobold Kitsch". 1
However, before moving on to a more detailed discussion, it is an
unavoidable necessity to draw attention to certain opinions which place
in jeopardy the entire raison d' Otre not only of the present study, but
also of all others connected with kitsch, despite Burghard Rieger's
optimistic contention that it is superfluous nowadays to justify dealing
with trivial literature. 2
It has been asserted that even if the term 'literature' may be
applicable, 3 works of inferior literary standing are scarcely worthy of
the attention of critics, whose efforts would be more profitably directed
towards the investigation of works of generally accepted literary merit.
Formerly, 'literarische Wertung' itself was not deemed an integral part
of literary criticism, and for a long time was even considered 'unwissen-
schaftlich'. 4 'Wertung' and 'Interpretation' were therefore commonly
held to be two completely separate procedures. Many, such as Fritz
Lockemann, still ascribe to this view, 5 though others, such as Rent
Wellek and Austin Warren, rightly suppose that
"though separation between the exegesis of meaning (Deutung) and the judgement of value (Wertung) can certainly be made, it is rarely, in 'literary criticism', either practised or practicable",6
so that the inference may be drawn that Wertung l will be at least implicit
in any form of literary definition or designation. 7 Any value judgements
that were undertaken in the early decades of this century seldom extended
into areas other than those enjoying the general sanction of literary
4
criticism. Leonhard Beriger, in his early study of 'literarische Wertung',
was not unduly concerned with kitsch or anything approaching it; he
believed that it was "wertvoller, EinwAnde gegen Goethe zu erheben als
gegen Kotzebue." 8 This attitude has become increasingly outmoded in the
course of the present century, though there are those who still espouse
it. Jochen Schulte-Sasse has justifiably taken Walter Maller-Seidel to
task for the expression of a similarly restricted view. Speaking of
Hedwig Courths-Mahler, the latter states:
"Solche Prosa verdient in der Tat das Etikett Kitsch. Wir nehmen es zur Kenntnis, wenn wir es nicht schon wussten, und regen uns nicht weiter auf. Aber nachdem das Urteil ausgesprochen jet, geht die Wissenschaft diese Prosa nicht mehr viel an
In Sachen der literarischen Wertung beginnen die Probleme jen- seits der weithin eindeutigen Urteile."9
Harold Rosenberg, too, has inveighed against scholarly concern with
kitsch (this time from a sociologist's point of view) in a review of a
collection of sociological essays entitled Mass Culture, compiled by
Bernard Rosenberg and David Manning White: 10
"Every discovery of 'significance' in Li'l Abner or Mickey Spillane helps to destroy the distinction between kitsch and art. One of the grotesqueries of American life is the amount of effort that goes into displaying the wisdom secreted in bad movies and in proving that modern art is meaningless. But it is nothing else than the intellectualization of kitsch, in which the universities, foundations, museums play their part, that makes popular media into such a tremendous social force against the individual in this country, as in the Soviet Union. If only pop- ular culture were left to the populace :mil
According to Harold Rosenberg, then, scholarly involvement with
kitsch merely serves to elevate it to a position of greater importance
than it deserves. Yet the significance of kitsch cannot be denied any
more than the significance of art, and to suggest, as Harold Rosenberg
does, that "there is only one way to quarantine kitsch: by being too busy
with art", 12 is hardly an acceptable solution. Even if kitsch is ignored
by intellectuals it is most unlikely to go away, and just because it is
5
studied by them it would be false to assume that the intellectual mind it-
self had fallen prey to kitsch. In all fairness, though, Harold Rosenberg
rightly points out that "one aspect of mass culture is kitsch criticism
of kitsch", and even thinks that "it might be more important than kitsch
itself, since it relates to the morale and capacity of the intellectuals
who are not yet in the service of mass manipulation,"13 There may be
a good deal of substance in this, and certainly Harold Rosenberg is not
the first to have been aware of the danger of critics lapsing into the
very mode they so decry in othersoither in respect of their ideas or
their enunciation of them, perhaps in an excess of zeal to do justice to
their cause. One of the earliest books on the subject, Fritz Karpfen's
Der Kitsch, which appeared in 1925,14 evoked adverse criticism in a
review of the same year, 15 on account of its stylistic extravagances,
criticism subsequently reiterated by later commentators. 16 Hans Dieter
Zimmermann has attacked the ideas of some critics of kitsch who tend to
oversimplify the issues involved, maintaining that "des Ergebnis der
Arbeiten dieser Literaturwissinschaftler ist nicht selten fast so trivial
wie die Literatur, die ale untersuchen."17 Jochen Schulte-Sasse has
warned that interpretations of kitsch all too readily deteriorate into
emotionalism and subjectivity. 18 This does serve to underline the need
for caution on the part of any future contributors to this field if this
particular hazard is to be avoided.
It is also easy for those who concern themselves with kitsch to
become the target for accusations of I theme-hunting'. 19 Wolfgang Clement
as early as 1962, considered that the possibility of discovering new
angles of approach towards authors of high literary standing was rapidly
becoming exhausted,.and that therefore critics were turning their attention
towards "bereits halb oder ganz vergessene Antoren t entlegene Gebiete
und Werke von fehlendem kOnstlerischen Wert". 2° Clemen t too t expressed
the fear that in so doing works of limited merit might tend to be ranked
6
alongside the genuine work of art, and thus all critical standards would
be lost. Others, such as Hermann Bausinger, have taken the opposite
view, and think that the study of trivial literature will, in fact,
help in establishing working criteria for the distinction between worthy
and mediocre or bad literature. 21 Hans Friedrich Foltin also maintains:
"...vielleicht wird gerade die Etforschung des Asthetisch Minderwertigen
und Uberholten unseren Blick ffir des Originelle und Vollkommene schlrfen."22
It is surely true that comparison forms an important element of literary
criticism, for it is logical to assume that if there are no criteria
whereby a work may be pronounced bad, it is equally impossible to intro-
duce a standard whereby a work may be said to be meritorious. However,
there are those who warn against attaching too much importance to this.
Manfred E. Keune, in his review of the collection of essays by Heinz
Otto Burger, Studien zur Trivialliteratur, states that this optimism
"dart nicht zu allgemeinen LehrsAtzen verleiten, denn eine rein positivistische Methode z.B., die sich im Hinblick auf emn Lesepublikum mit Absatzziffern und Konsumentengruppen begnUgt, kann in ihrem wissenschaft- lichen Fifer durchaus nicht das Mysterium des dichter- ischen Kunstwerkes offenbaren."23
It is evident from the above that it is not merely the literary
critic who has begun to be concerned with kitsch. It has also permeated
the spheres of the sociologist, the psychologist, the moralist, the
philosopher, the theologian, the librarian and the pedagogue. Their
approaches to the problem will come under scrutiny later; at this point
our concern must be to establish the field of study to which kitsch
most properly belongs, or whether all can lay claim to some degree of
relevance.
Although representatives of the afore—named .disciplines have brought
forth valid testimonies as to the significance of kitsch for their own
particular area, there are some who have queried the study of kitsch
by the literary critic.. Joachim MUller, for instance, has maintained
7
that this may be left to the sociologist, though he admits of "mancherlei
Grenzerscheinungen" which could involve both parties:
"Eh kann nicht geleugnet werden, dass die gesellschaft- liche Fbnktion der VulgAri- und Ttivialliteratur sehr ernst zu nehmen let... Insbesondere muss aus gesell - schaftskritischer Perspektive die Rolle genau erforscht warden, die im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert die Massenlit- eratur gespielt hat. Ursache und Fblge des 'Konsums' an solcher Literatur der breiten Leserschichten be- dOrfen der wissenschaftlichen Erkundung. Aber diese Aufgaben sind in erster Linie dem Gesellschaftshistoriker zu Uberantworten, der nach anderen Prinzipien analysieren muss, ale sie der Literaturhistoriker bei der Betrachtung des Sprachkunstwerks anwendet. Oder will jemand der Marlitt oder der Courths-Mahler die Ehre antun, sie mit den Kriterien der modernen literaturwissenschaftlichen Strukturanalyse zu untersuchen, mit denen wir uns Bald- erlins 'Friedensfeier' wissenschaftlich zu eigen machen?"24
However, since trivial literature is, after all, literature, it must
certainly be the legitimate business of the literary critic, especially
in so far as aesthetic and theoretical criteria are concerned, though
this does not mean that there is no place for investigations of a
different nature. Indeed, there have been innumerable calls for increased
interdisciplinary involvement. In 1972 Heinrich Breloer and Rainer Zimmer
were aware that this was an essential requirement:
"...Solange die Literaturwissenschaft sich nicht ale Gesellschaftswissenschaft versteht und ale solche in Zusammenarbeit mit den anderen Sozialwissenschaften deren Ergebnisse integriert, wird sie nur von einem mehr oder minder allgemeinen, d.h. vagen Konsensus ausgehen 'Omen. Erst wenn sie in interdisziplinArem Zusammenwirken effektive Verfahrensweisen zur Unter- suchung von Fragen der Produktion und Rezeption von Literatur entwickelt, wird sic eine wissenschaftlich befriedigend abgesicherte Fblie fOr die Konfrontation von Fiktion und RealitAt heranziehen k8nnen."25
Four years before, in 1968, Hermann Bausinger displayed even greater
optimism in welcoming the interdisciplinary initiatives that were already
underway,26 and in the last decade there has definitely been evidence
of an intensified consolidation of these efforts.
Despite recent progress, the cautious, even dilatory advance in the
admission of Iliterarische Wertung' in general and kitsch in particular
8
as legitimate fields of study is witnessed by the apparently impelling
need on the part of many critics to qualify or modify their own statements,
as if fearing censure from more orthodox quarters of their discipline.
This applies especially to literary critics. Hans Friedrich Patin, for
example, whilst advocating on the one hand the desirability of co-operation
between different disciplines and of the production of a greater number
of relevant investigations, declares in the same essay that "es were
natOrlich verfehlt, wenn man diesen ganzen Bereich ebenso grOndlich und
vollstlndig erfassen wollte wie die Hochliteratur", 27 which appears rather
an unfortunate contradiction, but it does illustrate the reservations
still prevalent even amongst some of the keenest and most notable con-
tributors. Be that as it may, the importance of interdisciplinary activity
should not be underestimated, for there is always a certain amount of
overlap between disciplines, and each can draw profitably on the other's
experience, the various angles of approach facilitating a more complete
understanding of the issues involved.
It seems from all this that doubts cast upon the desirability or
otherwise of dealing with kitsch and its cognates are largely unfounded,
and, on the whole, the notion that trivial literature and its exponents
are unpalatable items within the ivory towers of literary scholarship is
now almost outdated, as is proved by the growing number of critical works
available. Even in 1955, Jacob Beisner, in one of the first university
dissertations on kitsch, lamented:
"Das Meer der Meinungen Ober Kitsch mit ihren oft beftemdlichen WidersprOchen hat uns, statt Einsicht zu bringen, eher in Verwirrung. versetzt. Wenn man je in wissen glaubte, was Kitsch ist, weiss man es nach der Lekttre auch nur der bier genannten (zahl- reich vermehrbaren) Literatur Ober Kitsch nicht mehr",28
whilst in 1966 Erik Lunding complained of the "bald ins Uferlose wachsende
Forschung Ober MassstAbe fOr Kunst- und Kitschbewertung". 29 These lamenta-
tions would be even more appropriate today owing to the huge increase of '
9
interest in the last ten or fifteeen years. The many different approaches
emphasise that there is as much scope here as in the case of high literature,
if not more so, since despite all the confusion it is, after all, only
comparatively recently that a more broad—minded interpretation of the
function of literary criticism has begun to prevail. However, the lack
of a real theory of 'literarische Wertung' is still bemoaned, 30 and
notwithstanding all attempts to tackle the problem, it is scarcely any
nearer a solution, though since all literary criticism is based upon an
assortment of individual opinions, frequently widely at variance with
one another, the expectation of any sudden consensus is as infeasible
in this area of scholarship as in any other.
In spite of the fact that critical literature did not begin to employ
the term 'kitsch' until early this century, the mass of material since
then 31 is such that it will not be possible within the confines of this
study to discuss in detail the many different…