Der mehrfache Ort Überlegungen zu einer raumorientierten Literaturgeschichtsschreibung über die deutschsprachige Schweiz

Abstract

This paper discusses the question of a German-speaking literature in Switzerland, focussing on a spatially oriented literary history. It explores the work of two prominent scholars in the realm of the literary history of German-speaking Switzerland – i.e. Literaturgeschichte der deutschen Schweiz by Joseph Nadler and Literaturgeschichte in der deutschen Schweiz by Emil Ermatinger, both published in the early 1930s – contrasting the idea that a spatially oriented literary history should be based on the multidimensional characteristics of the place. In order to demolish this theory, the author recalls the positions of Keller, Gotthelf and Meyer, which are considered the founding fathers of German-speaking Swiss literature. In a second step, the author goes into the relationship between literary and touristic places – whereas literature is thought to lay the groundwork for tourism, and at the same time, however, to be critical of it. Finally, the author considers the Ticino as a literary place where evocations of the eighteenth century regarding it as a longing place and a multifaceted and multilingual literary development overlap.