Skalierungen des Mediterranen: Steffen Kopetzky (Risiko, 2015) und Jakob Hein (Die Orient-Mission des Leutnant Stern, 2018)
Scaling the Mediterranean: Steffen Kopetzky ("Risiko", 2015) and Jakob Hein ("Die Orient-Mission des Leutnant Stern", 2018)

Summary/Abstract: The article analyses the design and inscription of the Mediterranean in two recent historical novels that are both set at the outset of World War I. The point of departure are tropes of longing and desire, as they traditionally dominated the German discourse. The analysis attempts to illustrate the mechanisms of the literary engagements with integrative master concepts such as Fernand Braudel’s model of tiers of observation and the literary questioning of conventional configurations of time and space. The novels are understood as counter-narratives of contingency and absurdity that stage the collapse of traditional categories, as they were projected onto the Mediterranean, under the conditions of radical modernity that the historical moment engendered.

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