The first sentence of Goethe's 'Elective Affinities' poses many questions: Who is meant by the personal pronoun 'we' that calls a young baron Eduard? And are we to rely on that unusual literary naming procedure that intentionally destroys all fictional illusions? Further on in the novel we are informed that it is actually not a mysterious 'we', but rather that the wealthy baron himself, whose 'real' name was Otto, had chosen this name. This essay tries to elucidate the motives and intentions underlying Goethe's ambiguous and capricious game which he plays with the reader's expectations.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:DRESDEN/oai:qucosa:de:qucosa:31535 |
| Date | 07 September 2018 |
| Creators | Kohlheim, Volker |
| Publisher | Gesellschaft für Namenkunde e.V., Universität Leipzig |
| Source Sets | Hochschulschriftenserver (HSSS) der SLUB Dresden |
| Language | German, German |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion, doc-type:article, info:eu-repo/semantics/article, doc-type:Text |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | 0943-0849, urn:nbn:de:bsz:15-qucosa2-210625, qucosa:21062 |
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