History of German Literature 1830 – 1870

Büchner's "Danton’s Death" and Stifter's "Indian Summer", Heine's "The Harz Journey" and Fontane's "Ballads" - in their diversity, these works are milestones of an often underestimated, exciting epoch. Peter Sprengel embeds the development of new literary styles, forms and themes in a broad cultural-historical panorama ranging from America’s opening to Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung". He pays particular attention to the close interrelation between literature and politics in Prussia, Austria and the other states of the German Confederation as well as Switzerland. The literary life of the time was shaped by circles of poets and scandals as well as by the prosecution and exile of numerous writers. All in all, Peter Sprengel paints an exciting picture of an era that was in danger of being shattered by the tension between Biedermeier and revolution, between the reference to the past and progressiveness, while at the same time laying essential foundations for the development towards modernity.