PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2017, Arts and Sciences: Germanic Languages and Literature

In this dissertation I focus on two types of genre fiction as viewed through the lens of Kantian ethics and social contract theory. The two types of genre fiction include detective novels written by a German speaking Swiss author named Friedrich Durrenmatt, as well as two spy novels by John le Carre. All of these novels are set in the second half of the twentieth century and in le Carre's case, during the height of the Cold War. Durrenmatt is well-known throughout the German literary canon for both his plays and his prose. I argue that he tends to differ from other writers of detective fiction because he focuses less on the mystery of the murder itself and more on the interaction of the characters, as well as the philosophical ramifications of what is happening in the story. The first Durrenmatt novel, Justiz, focuses on the conflict between a failed lawyer, named Spat, and an influential member of Swiss high-society, Dr.h.c. Isaak Kohler, who has been convicted of shooting his friend, Dr. Winter, in a crowded restaurant. This novel focuses on Spat's tortured quest for justice, in that Kohler is able to elude justice. This first chapter sets up the idea of the Kantian hero and Kantian villain. Kantian heroes and villains differ from conventional heroes and villains in that they are judged not by conventional standards but by ideas of duty, or deontologically based ethics, as well as how they treat the inherent dignity of their fellow humans. This conflict between Kantian hero and villain continues into the second chapter, which is also a detective novel by Durrenmatt, called Der Richter und sein Henker. The villain in this story is just as villainous as the hero is heroic, and again I will work with Kantian ideas of ethics to enhance the ideas of what makes a hero or villain. By this point it will be the case that conventional methods of defining heroes and villains are quite different from Kantian standards. In the third chapter, I bring in the spy fiction of John (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Harold Herzog Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Werner Jung Ph.D. (Committee Member); Tanja Nusser Ph.D. (Committee Member); Richard Schade Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Germanic Literature

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 1907, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2006, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 1978, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects: Literature

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2016, Arts and Sciences: Germanic Languages and Literature

Questions of whether consciousness is beholden to the context in which it experiences the world or not form the central debate about the nature of human life within discourses of posthumanism. Drawing on the wealth of science fiction media, theorists such as Scott Bukatman, and N. Katherine Hayles each make differing arguments about the direction humanity is heading in its ever-increasing convergence with advanced technology. While Bukatman's position calls for a redefinition of the subject and subjective consciousness in the face of a changing technological world, Hayles' focus on embodiment as the groundwork of existence refutes what she sees as the technological nightmares in Bukatman and his analysis of cyberpunk. However, this conflict did not begin in the late twentieth century; rather my work will argue that this debate, and indeed posthumanism as a whole, have their roots in the works of the German Idealists as they reacted against Kant and the Enlightenment. Specifically I will trace the roots of ukatman's argument to Fichte and his First Principle of Philosophy that grounds all subjectivity. Next I will trace the work of Hayles, who reacts directly against Bukatman in How We Became Posthuman to Holderlin, who in his essay “Being and Judgement” reacts directly against Fichte's First Principle and the idea that consciousness is independent of corporeal being. Through this analysis I will demonstrate the extremely widespread, but heretofore unacknowledged influence German Idealism has had, and continues to have, on contemporary culture and its relationship with technology.

Committee: Harold Herzog Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Tanja Nusser Ph.D. (Committee Member); Evan Torner Ph.D. (Committee Member); Valerie Weinstein Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Germanic Literature

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2005, Arts and Sciences : Germanic Languages and Literature

During the past two decades, a vast body of German literature has appeared that is interested not only in the Holocaust but also in the way Germans have dealt with the legacy of National Socialism over the last sixty years. Especially since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the German reunification, a number of literary works have appeared that use photographs to approach this limit-event and its remembrance in German national and private discourses. At the same time, the scholarly attention given to questions of memory and its representation has also sharply increased over the last few decades. Such debates have brought forth a number of demands in order for Holocaust literature to become productive for remembrance as well as for the creation of the present and the future. The following study investigates works by Monika Maron, W. G. Sebald, and Irina Liebmann. Of particular interest is the question of how these authors have integrated photographs within their texts in order to address and overcome the problems of Holocaust representation: the generational distance, absences and silences as well as the institutionalization and instrumentalization of memory. The first chapter lays out the theoretical framework that informs the discussion of the most vital concepts treated in this study: fact and fiction, history and memory, photography and text. The subsequent three chapters investigate the respective works written by the three authors: Monika Maron's Pawels Briefe (1999), W. G. Sebald's Die Ausgewanderten (1992) and Austerlitz (2001), and Irina Liebmann's Stille Mitte von Berlin (2002). I maintain that the complex and paradoxical nature of photography, most significantly its simultaneous claim to truth and to deception, renders it a particularly fruitful means to negotiate questions of factuality and fiction as well as memory and history. It allows these authors to engage the reader in a problematization of the concept of truth as well as the constructedness of all f (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dr. Katharina Gerstenberger (Committee Chair); Dr. Sara Friedrichsmeyer (Other); Dr. Todd Herzog (Other); Dr. Richard Schade (Other) Subjects: