Postmodern Literature: Definition & Characteristics

If something is referred to as «modern», you can assume in common parlance that it is current and up to date. This does not quite apply to the epochs of German literary history, because the epoch of modernism is followed by the literary epoch of postmodernism. The epoch designation derives from the Latin post ab, which means something like «behind» or «after». If from the postmodern is spoken, so that is the Epoch after modernity meant.

Postmodern Literature – Definition

The literary epoch of postmodernism is another very recent era. Therefore, it is difficultThe epoch temporal within German literary history classify. In some cases, postmodernism is set in the period between 1968 and 2000 located, in other cases the epoch begins 1989 and ends 2011.

Roughly speaking, postmodernism is thus located within the period from 1968 to 2011. Nevertheless, as with all other literary epochs, it is true that this is only one rough timeline of the epoch, on the basis of which they context of literary history can be located. the transitions between the different literary epochs are not hard and clear, but flownd.

The literary epoch of modern (1880-1920) is part of the postmodern era ahead. The epoch designation «modern» acts as a collective term for different currents such as Expressionism and Symbolism. What epoch to the postmodern connects – in other words: in which literary epoch we are currently living – is cannot be clarified due to the timeliness.

The authors of postmodern literature were increasingly influenced by the Plagued by the feeling that man was wandering disoriented through the modern world that had become complex. The epoch of postmodernism is therefore not run through by a common thread or a uniform guiding principle; instead, the authors attempted to complexity of the world – as well as their cultural and social changes – to capture and process in their works.

That’s why they are subjects of postmodern literature not uniform. Because of this diversity, it is still controversial today whether postmodernism can be called an epoch at all.

Postmodern literature – historical background

The historical background of the epoch is difficult to grasp due to the different temporal introduction. Will the epoch become the time from 1968 to 2000 assigned, the epoch of postmodernism begins with the Group 47 disbanded. This group is an association of authors of post-war literature who exchanged views on their works at regular meetings and criticized each other. The aim of Gruppe 47 was to promote previously unknown authors. With the disintegration of the group, the emergence of something new became possible.

However, most literary scholars advocate one beginning of the epoch of postmodernism a year 1989. The division of Germany into the German Democratic Republic (GDR) and the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) ended in that year fall of the Berlin Wall. The reunification of West and East Germany favored a new beginning.

Postmodern Literature – Characteristics

Key Features of postmodern literature are the reference to modernity, intertextuality, experiments with language and a fragmentary narrative – usually in combination with a unreliable narrative authority.

reference to modernity

The modern literary era was marked by Innovations in science and technology. In addition, the epoch was historically dated First World War shaped. Central to modernity is the break with traditions. The authors used their newly acquired artistic freedomto create their works according to their own ideas.

The Authors of Postmodernism rebelled against the desire to create something entirely new. Instead, they played with literary traditions and focused on recombining what already exists.

intertextuality

Intertextuality is one central feature of postmodern works. It refers to References to other works or References to historical events. The feature of intertextuality goes well with the recourse to modernity: nothing entirely new is created, but rather works with what already exists.

types of intertextuality

There are different ones types of intertextuality: quotes, parody, pastiche and montages.

In the citation will between direct and indirect quotes distinguished. At a direct quote will the text another text accurately reproducedwhile he was at a indirect quote paraphrased becomes.

becomes something parodiesis it exaggerated and distorted, to make fun of it. It makes sense to use well-known works, because the original must be known in order to understand the parody. However, one does not necessarily have to resort to individual works; a genre as a whole can also be imitated. In parody, the form is maintained but the content is changed.

pastiche can a form of parody be or Yours sincerely to express. It is an intertextual work that imitates an original. In doing so, he will style an author exactly imitated. A pastiche differs from plagiarism because it is openly stated that something is being imitated.

At a Assembly it’s about that Assembling different parts of texts, which transport different language styles and contents. This can create moments of surprise. There is one Approaching the increasing complexity of realitywith which the authors of postmodernism had to struggle anyway.

The epoch of postmodernism is linguistically characterized primarily by experiments. The authors of postmodern literature put an increased emphasis on the linguistic design their works. One beautiful and above all aesthetically pleasing languagee was the focus. To achieve this, they used a variety of stylistic meansn.

A clear example of such a language experiment is the poem «zahlenre4e» by Hans Manz. The spoken numbers result in words.

storytelling

Postmodern literature is characterized by a fragmentary narrative out. That means the events not linearbut iis told in sections. To achieve that are time jumpssuch as time lapse and time dilations usual.

One is also common unreliable narrator. The narrator grabs not only into the action and actively controls events, he also decides what knowledge is made accessible to the reader. So the narrator can events deliberately wrong or only incompletely tell. This often leads to shifts within the narrative contradictions result. These contradictions are not due to an error on the part of the author and are arousing in the reader Doubts about the trustworthiness of the narrator. Typical of this type of narration is a homodiegetic, but occasionally also a heterodiegetic narrator.

Postmodern Literature – Authors

To the best-known representatives of the epoch include: