German Realism in the United States

Fontane, Keller, Meyer, Raabe and Storm have received considerable critical attention from English-speaking scholars during the last two decades, however, the acceptance of these writers in the United States has been very uneven and translations of their works have been sporadic. This study explores the development of the American reception of these five authors within the context of the reception of German literature as a whole by examining those critical interpretations that have been available to readers in the United States since the middle of the nineteenth century.