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Rereading Monika Maron

Text, Counter-Text and Context

by Deirdre Byrnes (Author)
©2011 Monographs X, 196 Pages

Summary

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of the writing of Monika Maron. Her biography charts a complex relationship with the GDR state, from initial ideological identification to sustained, radical rejection. Situating its reflections on her work against the backdrop of a changing critical landscape, this analysis takes account of the re-contextualisation of her writing necessitated by the collapse of the GDR.
The author charts the development of a number of seminal themes in Maron’s œuvre. The search for an authentic form of expression in her earliest texts gave way to a focus on the writing and the rewriting of history. The demise of the political system in 1989 led to an exploration in her work of more intimate themes. Maron’s post-Wende writing makes an important East German contribution to debates on memory transmission and generational forgetting. Her most recent novels are concerned with the rupture and the ultimate refashioning of biographies in a post-GDR age.
Rereading her texts in a post-Wende light, the author explores the complexity of Maron’s relationship with the state from which she emerged and demonstrates how this complexity manifests itself in her writing before and after 1989. This study offers new perspectives on Maron’s work and illuminates the significance of her contribution to contemporary German literature.

Details

Pages
X, 196
Publication Year
2011
ISBN (PDF)
9783035300567
ISBN (Softcover)
9783039114221
DOI
10.3726/978-3-0353-0056-7
Language
English
Publication date
2011 (March)
Keywords
Monika Maron the collapse of the GDR contribution to contemporary German literature writing and the rewriting of history
Published
Oxford, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Wien, 2011. X, 196 pp.

Biographical notes

Deirdre Byrnes (Author)

Deirdre Byrnes teaches German at the National University of Ireland, Galway. She was awarded her PhD from University College Dublin. Her research and teaching interests include GDR literature, the literature and architecture of the Berlin Republic, and memory discourses.

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Title: Rereading Monika Maron