Tangled up in truths: German Literary Conceptions of Nature between Romantic Science and Objective Empiricism (2015)
Downing, Eric S. (Advisor)
Lindsey J. Brandt (Author)
Downing, Eric S.
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
This dissertation explores the relationship between literature and science in German-speaking Europe of the 1830s and 1840s against the backdrop of large shifts in conceptions of nature and natural inquiry. Many scientific and literary writers of this period reflected on the increasing tensions between early 19th century Romantic science and modern empirical science, as well as the implications of these tensions for fields such as biology and geology. The key texts examined in this context include Lorenz Oken’s journal Isis; Carl Gustav Carus’s Neun Briefe über Landschaftsmalerei and Zehn Briefe über das Erdleben; Annette von Droste-Hülshoff’s essay “Westfälische Schilderungen aus einer Westfälischen Feder” and poems “Die Mergelgrube” and “Der Hünenstein”; Adalbert Stifter’s painting “Bewegung II” and prose tale Kalkstein; and Georg Büchner’s prose work Lenz, trial lecture “Über Schädelnerven,” and dissertation on the nervous system of the barbel fish. Several of the texts examined here seek to reconcile the newer trend toward objective empiricism with older elements of nature discourse reflected, for instance, in Friedrich Schelling’s Naturphilosophie and the aesthetic-scientific approaches of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Alexander von Humboldt. As such, the writers in question often advocate for aesthetically inspired ways of knowing nature (i.e., through literature, Stimmung-oriented landscape painting, and more poetically attuned forms of science) as necessary complements to empirical science. Defending the aesthetic perspective was especially important at this time, as a rising trend toward disciplinarity threatened to isolate modes of knowledge—such as poetry and science—that were previously considered inextricable from one another. Particularly within the realm of literary history, this period of the 1830s and 1840s is typically framed in terms of political events; likewise, literary works are often interpreted and categorized based on their authors’ political views. My findings suggest that, by examining the literary and scientific writings of this era in dialogue with one another, another reading of this period is possible. Namely, literary and scientific authors across the political spectrum express common concerns about the increasingly complicated relationship between humans and nature, as well as the capacity of the arts and the sciences to gain knowledge about that relationship.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Thesis
B. Josh Doty;
(2016)
The Anatomy of Conscience: Science, Ethics, and Religion in Nineteenth-century American Literature
(/isis/citation/CBB174403585/)
Thesis
Carmen Bartl;
(2015)
Schiller und Freud: Vom Erhabenen zur Sublimierung. Eine Wissensgeschichte intellektueller Leidbewältigung
(/isis/citation/CBB325967071/)
Thesis
Michael Dee;
(2016)
Roots of Charles Darwin's Creativity
(/isis/citation/CBB344704069/)
Thesis
Attanucci, Timothy J.;
(2012)
Stories from Earth: Adalbert Stifter and the Poetics of Earth History
(/isis/citation/CBB001567396/)
Chapter
Roli, Maria Luisa;
(2010)
The Gaze and Optical Devices in Goethe's and Stifter's Works
(/isis/citation/CBB001024891/)
Article
Sonia N. Das;
(2017)
Failed Legacies of Colonial Linguistics: Lessons from Tamil Books in French India and French Guiana
(/isis/citation/CBB237149961/)
Article
Ivahn Smadja;
(2015)
Sanskrit versus Greek `Proofs': History of Mathematics at the Crossroads of Philology and Mathematics in Nineteenth-Century Germany
(/isis/citation/CBB691329368/)
Article
Manfred Vasold;
(2021)
Rudolf Virchow und die Religion (Rudolf Virchow and religion)
(/isis/citation/CBB023354116/)
Book
Giulia Virgilio;
(2023)
Parole al microscopio: i composti neoclassici nell'italiano delle scienze tra Settecento e primo Ottocento
(/isis/citation/CBB267827261/)
Article
Kaltenbrunner, Wolfgang;
(2010)
Literary Positivism? Scientific Theories and Methods in the Work of Sainte-Beuve (1804--1869) and Wilhelm Scherer (1841--1886)
(/isis/citation/CBB001024389/)
Thesis
Pourciau, Sarah M.;
(2007)
Explications: Etymology as Language Science, 1822--1941
(/isis/citation/CBB001560819/)
Chapter
Burchardt, Lothar;
(2005)
The School of Oriental Languages at the University of Berlin---Forging the Cadres of German Imperialism?
(/isis/citation/CBB000774971/)
Article
Vismann, Cornelia;
(2001)
The Love of Ruins
(/isis/citation/CBB000101054/)
Book
Petsche, Hans-Joachim;
(2009)
Herman Graßmann
(/isis/citation/CBB001022164/)
Book
Ferguson, Christine;
(2006)
Language, Science and Popular Fiction in the Victorian fin-de-siècle: The Brutal Tongue
(/isis/citation/CBB000610325/)
Book
Petsche, Hans-Joachim;
Kannenberg, Lloyd;
Keßler, Gottfried;
Liskowacka, Jolanta;
(2009)
Hermann Graßmann. Roots and Traces. Autographs and Unknown Documents
(/isis/citation/CBB001022166/)
Article
Bouterse, Jeroen;
Karstens, Bart;
(2015)
A Diversity of Divisions: Tracing the History of the Demarcation between the Sciences and the Humanities
(/isis/citation/CBB001551432/)
Book
Petsche, Hans-Joachim;
(2006)
Graßmann
(/isis/citation/CBB000953012/)
Book
Saunders, Barbara;
(2007)
The Debate about Colour Naming in 19th-Century German Philology
(/isis/citation/CBB000850388/)
Article
Haase, Fee-Alexandra;
(2002)
Ars critica: Der Rhetorlehrer Quintilian als Vorbild für Begriffe und Aufgaben von Kritik in neulateinischen Reden und Schriften Deutschlands im 18. Jahrhundert
(/isis/citation/CBB000201113/)
Be the first to comment!