The Tale of Bluebeard in German Literature
From the Eighteenth Century to the Present
Oxford University Press · Print & ebook · April 22, 2001
"Bluebeard", in which women are slaughtered by a monstrous husband and their bodies hidden in a horrible chamber, is the most hair-raising of tales; yet with its happy ending, it also has a utopian force.
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- Who it’s for
- Bluebeard texts become a lens on gender politics and civilization across German literature.
- Genres
- German Literary Criticism, Fairy Tale & Myth Criticism, Feminist Lit Crit
- Published
- Oxford University Press, April 22, 2001
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"Bluebeard", in which women are slaughtered by a monstrous husband and their bodies hidden in a horrible chamber, is the most hair-raising of tales; yet with its happy ending, it also has a utopian force. Using the idiom of literary criticism, the study considers Bluebeard texts as a seismograph of gender politics and of the process of civilization from seventeenth-century France to 1990s Germany, in a broad range of canonical and non-canonical, often forgotten texts.
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The study discusses Charles Perrault's French version of 1697, through Ludwig Tieck's versions of 1797 and classic versions by the Grimms and Ludwig Bechstein, to nineteenth-century romantic fiction, the savagery of High Modernism, and twentieth-century versions such as that of the Surrealist Unica Zürn. While the focus is on literature in German, this is the first full-length study published in any language of the history of Bluebeard, and it redefines the canon and our interpretations of this key tale.
Bluebeard in German Literature
Bluebeard texts become a lens on gender politics and civilization across German literature.
Come here for
- Bluebeard versions from Perrault to Unica Zürn
- Readings of gender politics and civilization
Expect
- Canonical and often-forgotten texts
- A focus on literature in German
Where it sits
| Feminist Lit Crit | 74% |
|---|---|
| Fairy Tale & Myth Criticism | 65% |
| German Literary Criticism | 50% |
Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.
Publisher categories
- Literary Criticism
- Authors
- Mererid Puw Davies
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press
- Published
- April 22, 2001
- Format
- Print & ebook
- Reading lane
- Literary Criticism